What I Wish I Had Told My Sons

Pleased as punch, snapping photos and cheering them on, their mother and I relished each moment with our sons. We couldn’t have been prouder. Both sons were graduating from business schools within weeks of each other. Both had earned exceptional grades and accolades from professors and peers. We heaped praise on them. We told them repeatedly how thrilled we were with their accomplishments. I even posted a tribute to each one on Facebook. The more “likes” the posts received, the happier and prouder I felt.

Yet, in retrospect, something was missing. Not in my sons, but in me…and from me.

In addition to celebrating their well-deserved accomplishments, I wish I had also said:

I hope you know how deeply you are loved, regardless of the level of your success, or lack thereof. You never have to question your worth. There is absolutely nothing you could do to make God love you any more than he already does–and I feel the same way. My admiration and respect for you is certainly going to grow over time, but you can’t earn my love. It’s been firmly established in my heart from the day you were born. Being so deeply loved and treasured, you have all you need to genuinely love and accept yourself. You don’t have to prove anything to anyone.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that they shouldn’t keep growing and looking for ways to contribute to society. I am trying say, What matters most is not what you accomplish or how much others praise or admire you. What counts more is the love you have known and the love you can give. You must take your self worth from God’s view of you and from what Christ does in you and through you that brings God glory and serves his good purposes.

In saying all this, I certainly wouldn’t want to take the wind out of their sails or somehow make them ashamed that they feel proud of their accomplishments. No, I simply want to keep their success in the right frame. I wish I had said:

Be thrilled about all you have been able to do, accomplish, and experience, but not from a “Look how great I am” or “See, I really am superior to others” or “Man, I have it made” perspective. Rather, humbly get on your knees with gratitude. Pray that God would not let your achievements distract you from him and his will for your life. Celebrate all that God has given you as opportunities to learn, grow, and serve Christ in unique and fruitful ways.

In other words, success without a personal relationship with God and character is shallow at best, and dangerous at worst. Don’t measure the quality of your life simply in terms of career, status, or wealth acquired. Instead, be a lover of God and keep putting Jesus Christ at the center of your life and relationships. Always desire to become a better person as well. Ask the Holy Spirit to show you how you can best serve with what God has given you. Continually seek to be wise, humble, and overflowing with the fruit of the Holy Spirit—loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, and self-controlled (Galatians 5:22-23). That’s the life worth pursuing with your whole heart!

Now, having grown up in our home, both of my sons would have already heard most if not all the things I wish I had said at their graduations. Truth be told, it probably wasn’t they who needed to be reminded of these truths, it was I.

I was the one who was tempted to glory in their achievements in a puffed up sort of way. I was the one who wanted to throw my shoulders back and feel just a little bit superior to other parents. I was the one who relished feeling powerful by vicariously identifying with their newly acquired status. I was the one who needed help to keep the right perspective.

I wish I had told them, I’m struggling this weekend. Sometimes it’s really hard for me to live by what I believe and know to be good, right, and true. The Christian life is a humbling journey. I embrace certain ideals and values only to stumble as I face my limitations, resist what I know is right, and outright rebel when I’d rather serve myself. It’s only by God’s grace that I am able to get my head straight again, put my heart back in the right place, and correct my course when I find myself drifting or distracted.

I hope that my experience will help you to see that you, too, are utterly dependent on God’s love, mercy, and grace. You must surrender your will to God’s and keep looking to Christ to do in you what you simply cannot do on your own. This is not something you do once. It is a spiritual program for your daily life. In other words, the real power of the Christian life does not come from you, it comes from your relationship with God, and the extent to which you are willing to throw yourself into knowing Christ and being led by the Holy Spirit in every way imaginable. This is the life you were created to have. This is the life most worth celebrating.

That’s what I wish I had said to my sons.

“But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith” (The Apostle Paul, Philippians 3:7-9, NIV).