Years ago when Mom first visited me at college—I’d been a student there for six months and she hadn’t seen my room yet because it was a long flight from home—she looked with curiosity at the posters adorning the cinderblock walls, the dirty clothes piling up on the floor, the books and papers littering my desk. She might have said a typical mom thing like, “Why do you keep the place such a mess?” Instead she surprised me by saying, “I always feel better when I see where my kids live. It’s easier to picture them when I go to bed at night and say my prayers.”
I remember thinking, “Mom prays for me?” I never once doubted that my parents loved me but that Mom would regularly pray for her four children, in between sending us chirpy letters, candy at Valentine’s Day, calling us back whenever we made a call home so it wouldn’t be “on your nickel,” came as something of a surprise. Sure, she’d been a sterling Sunday school teacher, supervising craft projects that were the envy of the other teachers, but I never thought of Mom as a praying type person.
Now that I’m a parent I have a better understanding of the spiritual glue that keeps families together, the way you’re always praying for your kids because you’re also always thinking about them. On a daily basis I have a dozen images of my kids passing through my head, and yes, sometimes it means picturing them in their messy dorm rooms, praying that they’re doing their homework. That I passed through college with flying colors is surely a credit to my mom’s prayers, but that I’ve never thought of that until now is also a credit to Mom.
What she did for us kids never came with any strings attached. She didn’t expect a thank you. So here’s one, better late than never, and may I do half as good a job with Will and Tim. THANKS, MOM!
Rick Hamlin is the executive editor at GUIDEPOSTS.
