Life Through a 17 Year Old's Perspective

"My life stinks."  Those were not the words I wanted to hear out of my daughter's mouth this week.  But, as a young woman, going through life, she is starting to experience new struggles.  As a toddler, she had never understood what mommy and daddy were going through, but now, as she is creeping towards 18 at what seems to me to be a rapid rate, she is starting to see life's realities are not always rainbows and sunshine.  She's starting to lose that sweet innocence when it seems all is right with the world.  With this new awareness, however, she was starting to have a reaction I didn't like whenever something "bad" happened to her.  To her, it meant her life stunk.

It started off earlier last month when she didn't do so well on her exam.  She felt she had studied hard, but it was a very hard exam and she was probably relying more on her natural intelligence as opposed to hard core studying than she would ever admit.  Needless to say, she'll be writing that one again.  Then, last week, she had had a little bump on the highway, but it could have been worse, I kept telling her!  Yes, it was going to cost us some money, but somehow we'd find a way to pay for it!  Then, only a few days later, she dropped my phone, shattering the screen.  That was it for her.  That was when she said, "My life stinks."  I knew if she didn't learn now that she needed to develop a different reaction towards life's curve balls then she would become an angry, bitter, negative person.  I didn't want her to be that way.

RM and I really prayed for her this week, that her spirit would recover and that she would start to learn what she was supposed to learn.  Then, we talked a lot about how yes, there were a number of "awful" things that had happened to her, but really, there were so many positives!  She was alive!  She was safe!  She could write the exam again!  She was learning how to study!  She broke the phone's screen, but we could fix it!  Ourselves!  For a fraction of the price!  I wanted her so desperately to learn this life's lesson.  In fact, I couldn't help but see that God wanted her to learn this lesson more than I did.  Why else would all these things be happening except that He was trying to teach her this?

Then, yesterday, another test.  She drove home and didn't notice the gas guage and ran out of gas, or so we thought, at a red light.  Thank goodness for the broken-screen-working-cell phone!  So off RM went to get her some gas, along with the friend she'd been babysitting for earlier that morning, but when the gas went in.....the van still wouldn't start.  "My life stinks!"  I'm sure that was what RM was thinking at that time!!!!   But fortunately, RM has learned, "God is in control....even when it doesn't make sense."  That was from the lesson of Daniel as well as just being older and realizing how many times this sort of thing has happened to us and yet God provides.  I was so curious, though, how my daughter would handle it this time.

I looked at her when she came home, thinking for sure "My life stinks" would come out of her mouth, but she was smiling.  In fact, she was asking if she could go shopping later, a clear sign she didn't think her life stunk anymore!  I'm praying that she's realizing this is just a part of life.  We can't control what God is going to allow into our lives, but we must assume it is for our good.  I trust that she is learning this lesson now.  It will save her a lot of grief later.  We know, sadly, that more "stinky" things will come her way.  In fact, literally, more stinky things are coming our way!  We are going to have to deal with our septic system soon....it is showing signs of not being happy!  But these literal stinky things in our lives, in her life, are all part of a master plan, one we don't see and would never choose for ourselves.  Yet, the Creator or this world, of her life, knows what is best for her and for all of us. 

If she can learn to rest in that then she will not be shaken.  I would much rather have her go through life problem-free, to be honest.  I really don't love watching my kids struggle, but yesterday, when she was stuck at the red light and I couldn't help her, I kept thinking of the verse I'd written about yesterday, "As a man carries his son....."  I knew God would carry her for me, just as RM was driving out to literally pick her up, I knew God would carry her, too, as well as carry us, through yet another trial.