Son You Need A Job

Son You Need A Job

Our son is 16, a junior in high school, and I think it's time he gets a part-time job, to learn responsibility, self-reliance, and the value of money. And while my husband and I agree, the process to get him there is more about me than it is about him.

Background

My son turned 16 last June and got his driver’s license that August. He played football and because of practice twice a day, and football camps, getting a summer job at that time was not feasible. After he suffered his second concussion, football was over for him.  Naturally, I thought after he recuperated he would be "hitting the pavement" to find a part-time job. I would tell him, “I saw a sign (at so and so place) that they are hiring," or "Have you put an application in (at this and that place)? I think I saw some new faces." I'm thinking, come on son you need to get a job.

You see, as his mother I was worried. He's 16, I have one more year with him and I need to get him prepared to start standing on his own two feet. The real truth is I see him, being a little aimless, and I wonder inside quietly, will he be the person that God has determined he will be? I ask my husband in exasperation, what are we going to do about our son? I just don't understand.

For me it's hard to understand why he doesn't have a part-time job, a side hustle to have some money in his pocket, like mowing yards or shoveling snow. I am also concerned because I don't see that he has a viable plan for after high school. It's so foreign to me, because by the age of thirteen I knew what I wanted to become, what I planned to study in college, and had a summer job. By 16 I had savings, an after school job, and still had my summer job. As a senior in high school I paid my own expenses, had visited several schools, and had obtained scholarships to help pay for my education. I took classes in high school, joined clubs and participated in activities that would prepare me for the future. I was a type A personality, on maximum drive full steam ahead.

Insight

My frustration with our son, I am finding is affecting my conversation with my husband. I pray and pray, “God help our son to be the person you have created him to be,” but when I speak to my husband I am saying, "why aren't you making him do this or that?" My fear is that this lack of motivation is a glimpse of what is to come, an unmotivated child becomes an unmotivated adult. I often worry about where my son would be should something happen to my husband and I? So my fear for him has begun to consume me.

My son is a very laid back guy, who is not easily ruffled. He does things in his own timeframe and you cannot push him into doing something he does not want to do. This is a great attribute because he does not succumb to peer pressure, but as a take charge ‘do what I say’ mom, you can imagine my frustration. He is so much like my husband in that way; I run around high strung, a mile a minute, while my husband takes one task at a time until it's all done. I want to see actual progress, where he says, “if we do what we are suppose to do, all will be as it is suppose to be.”

My husband and I are two completely different people and our son is an interesting mix of us both. In realizing that my way is not working, I am trying harder to get myself out of the way and let God and my husband help mold him into the man he is suppose to be. My husband tells me that I have to let go of the reigns and let God guide him, and I can honestly say that it is the hardest thing to do. As we were at an all night prayer service, Proverbs 19:20-21 was a scripture provided for us to meditate on "Hear counsel, receive instruction, and accept correction, that you may be wise in the time to come. Many plans are in a man's mind, but it is the Lord's purpose for him that will stand." (AMP). Ouch, are my worries more about my plan for his life than God's plan for his life?  I had to ask God, “do I really mean not my will or do I mean let Your will be done?”

Victory

As simple as it may seem, I have to start looking at why am I letting this consume me I have always told our son "A man should always have money in his pocket but it should be gained by the work of his own hands." I have never wanted him to be a deadbeat, slothful, or an unaccomplished person. My desire for our son is that financially he will be self sufficient and that he will not suffer. My husband says our son may have to come to the end of himself, and hit rock bottom, before he gets an understanding of what he needs to do to take care of himself. Oh Lord, can I sit there and see that happen and not intervene?

I want our son to have a healthy relationship with work, and money, so he can take care of himself and his family. In my mind, that equates with being financially comfortable.  At the prayer service however, someone spoke on how we all want a life of comfort while here on earth, and we want to enjoy all of the financial blessings that comfort brings, but that is not what God promised us. In Hebrews 12:1-2 God says don't get tripped up by the baggage or sin of this world, "So then let’s also run the race that is laid out in front of us, since we have such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us. Let’s throw off any extra baggage, get rid of the sin that trips us up, and fix our eyes on Jesus, faith’s pioneer and perfecter. He endured the cross, ignoring the shame, for the sake of the joy that was laid out in front of him, and sat down at the right side of God’s throne" (CEB). As his mother I am trying to bypass God in the perfecting of our son so he can walk in the fullness of what God has destined for him.

Humph, I did not like hearing that, but it is true. We as a people of God cannot grow without testing. We cannot realize God is the supplier of all our needs unless we need something. Our son cannot become a man if he is not left on his own to work it out for himself. Sure he's only 16 but next year he will be finished with high school and he is going to have to determine what he is going to do with his life. I cannot do it for him.

My husband tells him, and me too (because I need to hear it), when he gets done with high school he has three choices: 1) College 2) The Military or 3) Get a full time job, whichever of the three he chooses he will be taking care of himself. I hear it and think he cannot take care of himself if he doesn't even have a work ethic. So I am frantic, trying to make sure that I have taught him all the lessons I think he should know before May of 2015 gets here. The truth is we are continually learning and growing with every breath we take and every day we live. We learn so much more from our failures than our successes.

As his mom I want him to succeed and to shield him from failure. I want him to be successful in life, but he has to want it for himself. I say I want him to learn to depend on God but I don't want him to go through the process of getting to a point of dependence on God. How can he ever know God is his redeemer if he's never been redeemed? How can I teach him to stand on his own two feet if I don't push him out into the world and let him see what it means to have to provide for himself?

Success is measured differently for every person. My greatest desire for our son should be for God to be pleased with him. I do believe that without a vision or a plan, a person will fall into despair but the plan should be measured by what God has set forth for that person, not by what we have made up in our own minds. I have to truly let go and let God have rule in this situation, not let my fears for his future frustrate me or my husband. I have to speak in one voice with my husband, to make it clear to our son that he will be responsible for himself. I have to believe that if he has to suffer on his road to being the man he is to be, that's ok, and that God will provide but he has to believe it for himself. So while it's true he needs to get a job, he needs to get a relationship with God and let God direct his path.

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you for the grace and mercy you give to us. Thank you for every trial you have seen us through. Thank you for the refiner's fire we have endured in the perfecting of our soul. God we are so grateful you do not leave us to die the death we so rightly deserve but you sent your son, dying on the cross under the weight of all our sins. God we are so grateful for the children you have blessed us with, whether they are biological, adoptive or our spiritual children. Lord you know our children can be a weight we carry. We can be consumed with concern for them. We know you have desire that they will know you as their Lord and Savior and we turn them over to you today God. We give them to you Lord to do what you will with them and through them. We know that the walk with you is not always easy and that some will come to know you at an early age and some will have to suffer before they come to know that you are the one true and living God. Father, we plead the blood of Jesus over their lives, that their destiny in you will not be aborted but that they turn themselves fully over to you. Lord we pray for their minds, that they will come to an understanding of who they are in you. We pray for their hearts that their generation will be the one that will not turn from you all the days of their lives. We pray for their souls, that they will not become prey at the devils hand being bold to preach your good news to the nations. We pray for their bodies that they will be pure, uncorrupted until marriage or your return. We know that you can keep them from falling and that your plan for them is greater than any plan we as their parents could ever have for them. Thank you for entrusting them to us and we give them back to you. In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.