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THE RACERS EDGE

YOU CAN’T CORNER IF YOU BRAKE TOO LATE!
By Stacy Tettemer – Racers for Christ

You’ve spent all winter getting your kart ready for that first race. After warming it in the pits, you move onto the grid. The wait for the karts in front of you seems endless. Finally, it’s your turn to practice.

As you ease onto the track, you start to get a little nervous. When you go into the first turn, you have a decision to make. How deep should you go and when should you get on it again when you come out? You make the decision in a flash. Your kart is suddenly doing a 360… waited too long. You’ll do better next time.

After what seems like days, they call your class again. Same routine: warm, wait, stage. This time, determined not to spin in the first turn, you let go of the throttle before you go halfway down the front straightaway. What a nimrod — two turns and nothing but embarrassment to show for it. Don’t worry, it’s only a race. If you don’t get it right today, there’s always tomorrow or next week. Sure, there are entry fees, fuel, food and miscellaneous expenses, but there is nothing permanent about it.

Now for the scary part. If you have children, you have to make the same type of decisions in their lives. How far do you drive them into a corner before you let go? Wait too long, and your children will have a difficult time learning responsibility. Let go too soon, and they run into a world they are not prepared for.

“I’m not letting go. Tommy will be with me forever!” Wrong! From the day he was born, Tommy started working towards independence. If Tommy was nursed, he needed his mother for every meal. When solid food was introduced, anyone could feed him. He still had to be carried everywhere he went, but he soon started to walk. Diaper changes were replaced by potty training. See a pattern developing? How about the first day of school, his first real love, and the heartbreak that followed. Every step led him towards independence. He still needed his parents, but a little less every day.

How do we know how much to let go and when? One of the real problems of being a minister is that people assume you have all the answers to life’s questions. Obviously, I do not. As parents, what can you do to ease through life? Here are some suggestions:

First, you can find a mentor—someone older than you who has been there. It’s amazing how much easier life is when you know that someone else has survived 2-AM feedings, potty training, the terrible twos and a host of other problems presented to you on a daily basis.

But more importantly, read the owner’s manual: the Bible. 2nd Timothy 3:16 says “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.” This is where your child’s core beliefs should come from.

Just reading isn’t enough. My deadline for this article was everyone’s favorite day of the year, April 15. Do you tell your children to be honest, then brag about how you got by with some deductions on your taxes that you did not deserve? Children are very perceptive. You can’t live one way and teach them another.

Letting go can be scary. But, if you instill core values in your children, you can rest in the knowledge that you have done what you could. Then you can let go and watch the turns. I’m betting on record laps!

END

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