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Watch over my son

Helen Grace Lescheid

When my son Jonathan announced that he and two buddies from high school would be driving to Disneyland in California, over 3,000 kilometres from our home in southern British Columbia, I panicked. Jonathan, at 17, had driven barely one year, and the other two boys, being younger, didn’t drive at all. Remembering the traffic on the freeways in California, I was terrified for him. “What if you have an accident? What if your old Nissan breaks down on the freeway? What if you get lost and you end up in the wrong part of Los Angeles?”

Jonathan waved all my worries aside. “Don’t worry, Mom. We’ll be all right.”

The following morning, we hugged. He squeezed his 6’4” body behind the steering wheel and flashed me a big grin. “See you in a week,” he said. The gleam in his eyes told me how much he was looking forward to his first real flight into independence. As I watched the taillights disappear down the road, I tried to conjure up excitement for him. After all, he deserved one last fling before another heavy school year began.

My tenuous excitement lasted until the afternoon of the third day when a man from Los Angeles phoned. “I don’t want to alarm you,” he said slowly, “but your son rear-ended my car.”

My heart stopped. I held my breath. I couldn’t utter a sound.

“The boys are all right,” he quickly added. “But your son’s car is pretty banged up.”

“Where is he?” I asked. “Can you put me in touch with him?”

Unfortunately, he didn’t know the name or phone number of the garage where he’d last seen the boys. As I hung the receiver back in its cradle, I slumped to a chair. Great! A banged-up car, and no money for repairs. All day I willed the telephone to ring. I wanted my son to be on the other end. I wanted to assure him that things would work out. I wanted to wire him some money. But Jonathan didn’t phone that day, nor the next, nor the next.

What do you do when worry for your son threatens to overwhelm you?

Looking for a promise from God, I kept reading Psalm 121: “The Lord will watch over your coming and going.” I remembered how God had taken care of us in the past, such as when I had been robbed of my purse in Frankfurt, Germany, losing our tickets home, our passports and all our money (God had worked in such wondrous ways that we’d come home just two days behind schedule). I engaged in mind-absorbing activities such as reading a book and writing an article. I humoured myself, saying, “It‘s not time to worry yet. Give yourself another day or two, and then you can worry all you like.” I asked others to pray for us. Throughout the year, I’d met with other mothers to pray for our children on a regular basis. Now I dialed up some of the women and asked them to pray specifically for safety for the boys.

About a week after the accident, near midnight, Jonathan sauntered through the back door into our kitchen, oblivious to the worry he’d caused me. His eyes registered shock when he discovered I already knew about the accident. To spare me unnecessary worry, he’d wanted to tell me in person. He apologized. “I was plenty worried myself,” he said. “But you know what, Mom? My banged-up car purred all the way home. Amazing.” Then he flashed me a big grin, “You must have been praying.”

I smiled. My son had gained much more than a taste of independence. He’d seen firsthand how God takes care of His children. And to think God did it without me!

Helen Grace Lescheid is a writer from Abbotsford, B.C.

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Last modified June 29, 2001.

© 2001 Mennonite Brethren Herald.
Published by the Canadian Conference of MB Churches.
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