Go Where He Goes

 "Bless them, change me." Anne Lamott

This summer I am embarking on a 7 week Bible study. Admittedly of my least favorite passage in the Bible, but that's neither here nor there.

If you know me, you know Bible studies aren't typically my jam. I don't like being told what to read when. I don't love lists of questions to answer. Somehow I was a good student in school/college albeit the one who always had questions.

If I'm honest, it's because my brain never naturally goes to where the author's does. What jumps out at me is never what the author wants to focus on. So I find myself expending energy on answering questions that don't authentically extend my study.

So I have learned that for a Bible study to work for me, I have to do the readings, consider the questions and chase the rabbits that do speak to me. It's a good balance because it gifts me community to discuss studies but doesn't limit me to just the author's perspective.

Yesterday I read the passage

16 But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. 17 Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” Ruth 1:16-17

Ruth's commitment to Naomi is admirable right? Ruth "clung" to Naomi - often a verb used in marriage vows.

I was thinking about this passage yesterday and considered that many of us want the people in our lives to "cling" to us.

In some ways, I'd love if my children said "Where you go, I will go and where you stay I will stay......your God my God."

Loyalty at the expense of all.

As we were watching Bye Bye Birdie yesterday, Albert Peterson very much wants to marry Rose. But not enough to upset his mother. He's willing to put his own happiness second to hers.

The hardest thing about parenting/relationships is embracing that at some point the roots become wings.

It's funny how we can see clearly someone else's problem. I kept wanting to tell Albert's mother to "HUSH" as we watched the musical.

Those of us who are in throes of parenting teenagers/young adults, know that devotion like Ruth's isn't a thing in action in most of our lives.

You won't find a growing young adult in my house saying "Oh mom - whatever you think is best, I'll do that."

In fact, whatever wisdom I have comes second to other relationships in their lives.

There's this innate need for them to push back. In order for them to find out who they are, they must separate from us.

They must not go where we go, they must not stay where we stay.

They must forge their own way.

Mama Warriors, I think many of us might miss the gift in this passage.

Ruth is clinging to God by way of Naomi.

Naomi is how the path gets created.

We hope we are part of the path that helped our kids know Jesus. But then, we have to step aside and let the route be direct.

Let them go where He goes, let them stay where He stays.

Someone told me once that I could never really mess my kids up. That I was giving myself too much power.

That the only real damage I could do was becoming an obstacle to the greater plan for them.

Which means a lot of time sitting back and watching them make mistakes. Because God grows us best in times of challenges.

Let them try out paths that make no sense. Let them wrestle in relationships. Let them figure it out.

"Bless them, change me. "