Emptying The Nest

Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Genesis 2:24

As our kids become older, we notice that, little by little, we are losing control. That’s what parenting is all about: the gradual loss of control. That’s when we find out how well we’ve done.

Ultimately all of us must say good-bye to our kids. Yet sometimes I find myself thinking angry thoughts about the process of emptying the nest. It just doesn’t seem fair to invest twenty prime years—the best years of my life—in four kids, only to see them walk away one by one and leave me for their own lives.

Whose idea was this anyway?

Let me answer that question from Genesis 2:24: “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” The Bible makes it clear that this whole leaving thing was God’s idea. As sad as we sometimes feel, as much as we grieve, as often as dread creeps into our lives when our kids move into their high school years, we need to remember this: the empty nest was God’s idea.