Graduation and other woes

This group of wonderful young people from our church have now graduated high school and are about to head off into the big wide world. Yesterday we held a special service for them to dedicate them and their future to the Lord and to wish them well. We made it very clear to them that we were by no means saying goodbye...we expect many visits!!

On the left we have Amber who will go to Adelaide to study childcare, then Tom who is moving away to start an apprenticeship, next is Fabian who has an apprenticeship lined up in Adelaide, and Sophie who will study journalism at Uni and Steph who will study acupuncture.

I was a bit worried about how I would cope during the service. I'm SO not ready to face the prospect of my little girl leaving home. I was doing ok until our worship leader asked the children and youth to sing the first verse of one of my favourite worship songs "Here Iam to Worship". Standing next to Stephanie, listening to her sing a beautiful song in her beautiful, sweet, clear voice was my undoing. I couldn't join in with the song when we were supposed to. Our pianist looked up and saw Steph singing with all her heart, and me being a dribbling mess and she almost lost it as well, which just made me worse!!

But all in all the service was lovely, and positive and a wonderful tribute to these amazing young people. A special moment was when their grandparents stood behind them and said a special prayer just for them (and they all had their grandparents there - how cool is that?).

My hope for this gorgeous young woman now is that she will remember the Lord when I'm not there to remind her. That she will look to her bible when she needs advice, and that she will always remember that our home will always be hers.

Lord, please help Stephanie remember that she is your princess. Encourage her to always look to your word for advice and to live her life for your glory. Amen.