I get the same feeling at the beginning of every school year. A sort of overwhelming excitement. It’s similar to that queasy stomach giddiness before the roller coaster starts. There may be fun coming, but it’s really the possibility of some scary bad that makes me shaky. That simple….I don’t know about this, what if?…feeling.

It’s the future. Of course we don’t know.

New stories ahead. We would love to be able to pick and choose our own lineup of plots, but that just isn’t the way life works.

Some years ago I underlined a couple of verses in 2 Thessalonians that helped me take a deep breath and enjoy the ride of a new school year in peace.

This is the story I want for each one of my children. Because really, if this prayer is their reality, ANYTHING that comes along this year is going to work itself out. As their mama, it is my job to pray my guts out on their behalf. What a privilege.

But I’m not stopping with just my own. This prayer is universal.

I pray this story for the children of all my friends.

I pray this story for the children of the school where I work.

I pray this for ALL children/teenagers/young adults headed back to school this month.

For our family, I hope that next May during those ten days when we will, Lord willing, attend three graduations, the stories we tell of this 2014-15 school year will be good ones. That we will be graced with the ability to laugh in love and joy at the things that happened this year.

I’m cutting, pasting and printing these words to linger over every day. Feel free to do the same!  Here it is paraphrased in The Message:

We pray for you all the time—pray that our God will make you fit for what he’s called you to be, pray that he’ll fill your good ideas and acts of faith with his own energy so that it all amounts to something. If your life honors the name of Jesus, he will honor you. Grace is behind and through all of this, our God giving himself freely, the Master, Jesus Christ, giving himself freely.  2 Thessalonians 1:11-12