Do things ever just strike you and make you wonder?

I regularly run into former students. This particularly relates to former high school girls. I remember them chasing boys and being chased. Covered in the trends of the day, wallowing in the culture of their youth, warring with all the awarenesses that are coming of age. Everything relating to hair, style, looks, relationships, and occasionally school were important.

Now I’m retired. I see them out in the world beyond high school, no longer the children they were and not quite the adults they will be. They are now paying rent, some married, many with children, holding on to life with drive and commitment. They are existing in a different world than the one which surrounded them in school.

I ask. “Do you remember who you were in high school, your priorities, your dating, what crushed your heart and what lifted it to the heights?” They remember because they are not that far from it. A teacher, a class, an assignment, getting a phone, the right kind of pants and clothes, and so much more crowded their thoughts. Friends, the drama of teen life, boys and holding hands – emotions crowding out and being pushed around by various responsibilities, which were dominated by others pushing them into the responsibilities. (I accept that some of this is overgeneralized and not accurate for all.)

I ask, “Now you are the MOM (to the girls who have become parents). How do you feel about that?” The cascading waterfall of comments fall out of them. They love their baby. All that brought them joy in high school is no longer important. The health and well-being of their child is the center of their attention. They are moved and motivated by their caring position of responsibility. Their hearts are dictated by the needs of another and the other’s well being. They are searching for answers and ways to protect and train. In many ways, they are no longer the person I knew at all. They are not the center, but pushed out to the side, no longer pushed into responsibility, but chasing it.

I ask, “So what do you think about your mother, now?” The view of their own mom has changed radically, but some parts remain similar. Their mother knew more than they understood in high school, yet they still believe they know more and can do better even now. They have a plan to be something to their child and overcome the difficulties their child faces, recognizing only faintly and not realizing completely that they are retracing the exact footsteps of their mom at that point of life. The circumstances may be different as the world changes over time, but the overlapping similarities are hard to miss.

Then I ask, “Do you say to your child some of the same things your mom said to you?” “Yes” is the most common answer. Mom’s care and protect. They say caring, protecting, and correcting things like they have heard because that kind of relationship is common to all ages. You must do —-, and must not do —-, and so much more. 

Here is the fascinating thing. Though they have completely changed their outlook, perspective, and priorities, they continue to see themselves as the same person. They do not loose their core identity as they transform into the next phase of self and the next. They see themselves as always identifiably the same soul even though all things within and without have changed. How is that?

Somehow this relates to salvation in my mind. Jesus saves and enters the core of a person’s life. All the time circumstances, feelings and experience come out of that core, the “unique me” they see, the “unique me” I see. Jesus enters all phases of our life and life’s timeline from that core identity position. He is able to go into any area of our lives and heal and redeem and restore. Our entire life timeline is open. I have seen Him redeem things long in my past and destructive and turn them into productive in my present. I can see Him then and now because He accepted all of me, the total package connected to the “unique me” when I accepted Him one day in my life timeline. Jesus is God of all.