When I was growing up, my dad loved to read Daily Guideposts every morning at breakfast, and quote scriptures to my siblings and me. “Bring up a child in the way that is right and when he is old, he will not depart from it,” one of my favorites went. Maybe because Dad followed that to the letter, teaching us what it meant to love the Lord so that when we struggled, my siblings and I always knew how to find our way back to faith.
As an adult, I took up Dad’s tradition, starting my mornings with Daily Guideposts. But on August 25, 1995, I didn’t feel like doing much of anything, including reading the daily devotional. Listlessly, I poured some cereal into a bowl and splashed in a little milk. I carried it over to the table and plopped down. Though it was a beautiful morning, I just couldn’t shake the sadness I was feeling over the loss of my dad. He’d passed away five years before, but I still missed him terribly. I wished I could hear from him one more time. Might as well do my devotions, I thought. I put down my spoon and grabbed Daily Guideposts from its place on the table, turning to the entry for that day.
I couldn’t believe it. There in that day’s reading was the Scripture I loved so much—”Bring up a child in the way that is right and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”
It was no coincidence. It was a message sent to comfort me on the toughest of days. You see, August 25 was Dad’s birthday.
