Scarred Yet Refined

For wisdom will enter your mind, and knowledge will delight your heart. - Proverbs 2:10

For every young person there exists two very divergent paths: the path to pain and destruction or the path to life and joy (not that this path doesn't have its own pain). The world will take you down the first path and God's wisdom will lead you down the second. Why is it then that so many young people, even those that claim to have a personal relationship with Christ, choose the wrong path?

As most of us know, young folks feel they must express their independence. Could it be that since Christian parents hold forth the path of biblical wisdom, their children often feel that rebellion against that wisdom is the path of independence? It is a quandary and challenge for those who minister to and parent youth in today's culture, and it will always remain that way! We must find ways to help believing youth to express their individuality without abandoning biblical truth.

If they survive their youthful indiscretions unscathed, and tragically some will not, they will learn, mature, and one day face the same challenges their parents once faced and do their best to convince their children of these same truths. By God's grace, we all eventually emerge scarred yet refined.

It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. - Frederick Douglass