Mizpah

Devotion

5-7-10

This devotion is dedicated to my daughter, Semah, who will be leaving in three days to serve in the Peace Corps in Bulgaria for 27 months.

 

Mizpah

Genesis 31:49

“and Mizpah, for he said, ‘May the Lord watch between you and me when we are absent one from the other.”

 

 

 

Every parent knows how difficult it can be to send off a child to their first day of school, drive on their own for the first time, send them out on their first real date, leave for their first year at collage, watch them get married, move to another state, etc.  There is an emotional bond that connects a mother’s heart with her child. For most moms that is. It is a bond different than a bond between father and child.  We moms have carried them inside us, for those moms who went through an adoption process you had a bond of desire and longing to hold a child inside you and for both kinds of moms we have felt our hearts skip a beat as we held our precious children in our arms. We have sung to our babies, taught them to walk and talk, we have dressed them up like little dolls, cried when we couldn’t get them to sleep, stayed up endless hours nursing or bottle feeding them, disciplined and corrected them to mold them into productive adults, we have had days when we weren’t sure they were our children, moments of laughter and tears, dreams of what they would look like all grown up, daily prayers for their protection and wisdom, hopes for their future to be filled with love, joy, hope and peace, and that never ending desire for them to have a life committed to God.  And though we go through all this to prepare them for their own life as an adult with a passion to spread their wings and fly into the path God calls them to, it is still difficult when they fly.

 

Laban understood this when Jacob was ready to leave with his daughters and make a life for themselves. (See Gen 31)  Laban wanted to be sure Jacob would take care of his daughters and bring them no harm.  So they made a covenant between each other and asked God to watch over them while they were apart from one another to keep that covenant. They had a Mizpah according to Jewish tradition. A Mizpah is a covenant, a promise between two parties. 

 

As moms we have the opportunity to crate a Mizpah with our children.  Making a covenant with them to each do our part in protecting the relationship and keeping it strong no matter the distance between us, and as we do we understand the meaning of the Mizpah as explain in Genesis 31:49 “and Mizpah, for he said, “May the Lord watch between you and me when we are absent one from the other.”

 

As a mom I long to be in the presents of my children and watch them interact, develop into adults and I am in awe of their passions and desires for life, love and God.  I desire to see them able to stand on their own feet as dependable and committed adults who serve the Lord in every area of their lives.  I have raised them to be able to know the source of their help in times of trouble (the Lord) and to go to Him first.  I knew as their mom I was given them for a time and as a gift from God to raise them for Him.  Nevertheless, as their mom, my heart still aches when we are separated.  Though I do not fear for their lives, I have the confidence they will succeed at whatever they do, and they will be bold in their faith, I still find it not to be an easy task of letting go, just like Laban.

 

This Monday, May 6, 2010 I will let go in the biggest way yet as a mom.  My youngest daughter will leave for her service with the Peace Corps in Bulgaria.  I am so proud of her and would never dream of asking her not to go, yet the lump in my throat is hard to swallow.  I know the Lord has gone before her to prepare the way.  I know He is with her every step of the way. And I know He will be her rear guard to protect her in all her ways. I praise Him and thank Him for that.

 

My heart beats with joy and with tears. I will make this covenant with my daughter, a Mizpah that the Lord would watch between me and her while we are absent one from another.  In that I can let go and let God do His work in her and through her as she takes His love, joy, peace, and hope with her to Bulgaria.  What an awesome Mother’s Day gift I have been given from God.  He has shown me that my little girl is His completely and ready to fly. He has answered my deepest prayer for her. Tears of joy and longing now become friends. So fly my little angle the Lord watch between us. Mizpah!