Launching

 Then Jesus came up and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”  Matthew 28: 18-20

The ultimate goal of parenting is successfully launching our progeny out into the world and watching them flourish (you thought I was going to say grandkids, didn’t you?). Jesus managed to do this with His disciples in only three years and we are typically given more like 18-20.

He got to start with adults, you might argue, making it easier to teach them! Ah, but He also had to UNteach them! By the time Jesus got them they already had a lifetime of bad habits developed that Jesus had to patiently work with and love them through. One of those bad habits, Judas’ greed, even got Him killed.

But Jesus didn’t have to deal with teenagers! Oh contraire! According to Got Answers, Jesus’ disciples were likely between the ages of 13-30 years old. In fact, it is likely that several of them were between 13-15 as this is when young men at this time would begin to follow a rabbi. While it is true that many of the challenges of parenting teenagers these day are constructs of our current society and these formative years looked very different at this point in history, the fact remains that these young men were still going through the physical changes all young men undergo at these ages and would be experiencing many of the psychological ones as well. Many of them had just left home for the first time (James and John left the fishing boat with their father). They were trying to find their place in society (look at all the arguments about who would be first or sit at Jesus’ right hand). Jesus definitely had to deal with teenagers.

But Jesus is God! He’s perfect! Yes, but even as a perfect God, He was guiding imperfect people, just as we are. And, as we saw, they didn’t all follow a textbook path and come out sparkling. Thomas doubted, Peter denied Christ three times, and Judas betrayed Him. When push came to shove in the garden, they all scattered. What does that teach us? How our kids come out is NOT all dependent on us. Even if we were perfect, they wouldn’t be. That doesn’t excuse us from doing our best, of course.

Here's the Thing: When our kids move out, our job isn’t over. Launching them into the world is just one more phase. I will always be my kids’ mom, and they’ll always be my kids. We spend the first phase of their lives working toward this benchmark, but then our focus shifts, it doesn’t end.