Dear Rose Park,
A few days ago I heard an interesting conversation on the radio. It essentially boiled down to this: we’ve all heard of helicopter parents (a parent who hovers over their children making sure nothing bad could ever happen), but the host of this radio show was talking to a family therapist who introduced a new-term called the snowplow parent. Have you heard of this? It refers to when a parent pushes every struggle out of the way (like a snowplow) in order to make the road for their children stress-free, pain-free, and challenge-free.
I’m not an expert in parenting, I certainly don’t play one on television, and the central theme of this letter isn’t parenting; instead, this is a letter about how the people of God are in relationship with God. Here’s what I mean: the family therapist on this radio show shared how at the root of the ‘snowplow parent’ is an over-estimation of the problem and an under-estimation of the child. In other words, when a child is faced with any sort of challenge or struggle, the snowplow parent over-estimates the problem and under-estimates the child. In effect, the snowplow parent is communicating, “that problem is too big and you are too small.” It’s this phrase that caught my attention as it relates to the people of God.
I wonder if the Church over-estimates our problems and under-estimates our God. I wonder if somewhere along the way we’ve forgotten how grand, majestic, and all-powerful our God truly is. I don’t mean to under-estimate financial struggles, relationship pain, and a global pandemic because these are serious problems that need to be dealt with, however I do mean to put them into perspective as it relates to the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the Alpha & Omega, the Word made flesh, and the Rock and Redeemer of Salvation. This is all to say, perhaps somewhere in your faith is an over-estimation of your problems and an under-estimation of God.
If that’s the case for you, then I encourage you to join us here at Rose Park as we seek to center our lives around the glory of Jesus. Even from a distance we strive to connect the disconnected, empower the connected, and reconcile all things to God. By reorienting our lives around the glory of Jesus we reconcile all things to God. One way we can do this is through prayer.
This Friday (5/1/20) at 7:00pm we’re inviting you to pray with us for fifteen minutes. This isn’t a video to watch online, just an invitation to pray. More information will be coming in the next twenty-four hours about the framework of these fifteen minutes, but wherever you are and whoever you are with, would you make it a point to pray with us? Because when we center our lives around Jesus we will be able to see more clearly the over-estimations we have made of our problems and the under-estimations we have made of our God.
Grace & Peace,
Pastor Mark