Trusting God with the Year Ahead (Special Care to Parents of High School Seniors) - Your Nightly Prayer - December 29th

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Your Nightly Prayer

Trusting God with the Year Ahead (Special Care to Parents of High School Seniors)
Your Nightly Prayer
by Meg Bucher

TONIGHT’S SCRIPTURE

“I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.” – Romans 15:13 (NLT)

SOMETHING TO PONDER

There is a prayer I picked up from a beloved pastor that has worked its way into my daily prayers. “You are the One who holds all things together, including me.” As my oldest daughter turns the pages on her Senior year in high school, and submits her college applications, all the dreams she has been dreaming are now off in cyberspace waiting on directions. That’s how it can seem …when everything we can do to make them come true is stored in the barn, and waiting on the next step is all we can do.

I have faithfully dreamed those dreams beside her since she was able to speak them into the air. The word count between us is criminal, and we’re so aware of it. Her dreams are my dreams for her, and the pressure and possibility of it all somehow looking different than the picture in our minds and the plan in our hearts is an overwhelming amount of pressure …as the applications are off in cyber space …and unknown eyes will read letters of recommendation and make decisions that will alter the next course of my daughter’s life …and therefore mine.

The Apostle Paul reminds us, in this verse, of the importance of an ever-increasing trust in God. Each day brings a new challenge we have to submit to him, in exchange for renewed, refreshed, and strengthened trust in God. He’s the only one who has all the answers we’re looking for. The source of all life. The One who holds all things together. He is holding me together, quite literally, as I watch all of the lasts and witness the marking of time in this final year of her residence under my roof, in my home, in close proximity. Letting go will be a joyous celebration, launching her into the world to bring glory to God with all of those big dreams and hard work. What it will look like is something only God knows, right now. For now, we wait. As the New Year flips over, my resolution is to trust God more. It’s the only way I’ll make it through the anticipation and separation of watching my grown baby fly into who she was always meant to be.

YOUR NIGHTLY PRAYER

Father,
Bless and calm us this evening, as we wait and wonder what the next steps in our lives – and for some of us, our children’s lives- will be. Increase our trust in you, God. Joy, peace, and confident hope …these are the products of trusting You, God. Help us to know You better, feel Your presence more prominently, and habitually leave our worries at Your feet. I pray my daughter’s big dreams -and all of the High School Seniors opening a new chapter in their lives- come true in a way only You can write them. More than we can ask for or imagine.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen.

THREE THINGS TO MEDITATE UPON

1. Most importantly, recite this verse aloud, stick it somewhere you can see it frequently, and pray it over your life and your child’s life. “I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.” – Romans 15:13 (NLT)

2. God is the source of all hope. So often, we allow our thoughts to entangle us with worry. Focus on this truth: God is the source of all hope.

3. God will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. I can’t summarize the truth of this Scripture any better than that. You will overflow with confident hope. What is required to accomplish these feats? This is God’s character, and through our full acceptance of Jesus’ sacrificial death, we receive His very Spirit, who resides in us and accomplishes these miraculous realities in our everyday lives.

Reflect on tonight’s prayer and share how God met you there. Join the Your Nightly Prayer discussion on the Crosswalk Forum.

Meg Bucher Meg writes about everyday life within the love of Christ. She earned a Marketing/PR degree from Ashland University, and stepped out of the business world in 2008 to stay home and raise her two daughters …which led her to pursue her writing passion as a blogger, freelance writer, and author. A contributing writer for Salem Web Network since 2016, Meg is now thrilled to be a part of the editorial team at Salem Web Network. You can find her entire body of work on her Amazon Author Page.