Homeschooling in the Homestretch: or: Don't Worry

 

 

 

Don’t worry about tomorrow. It will take care of itself. You have enough to worry about today.

Matthew 6:34 (CEV)

 

 Next week starts the final school year of Rory's homeschooling life.  He is officially a senior.  Yesterday, he went to take the ASVAB test to begin his pre-enlistment process into the Army.  I'm getting a little sentimental here, as I think of the little kindergartener that we pulled out of school so many years ago.  I was so scared I was doing the wrong thing.  I didn't know what he was supposed to learn, or how to teach it to him.  I pushed too hard sometimes, and not hard enough others.  He learned things that other kids in his grade didn't know, and didn't learn things that they did.  His sister came along and learned everything at a completely different time and in a completely different manner.  We fought, we cried, we hugged, and we laughed.  And the whole time I secretly worried that I was doing it all wrong.  I worried that when all was said and done, he wouldn't be prepared for the next step.  I worried that he wouldn't know what he needed to know after high school.  I worried a lot.

 

Yesterday I brought my "little boy" to a recruitment center to drive for an hour and a half each way with three people he didn't know to take a three-hour-long test.  My sheltered, homeschooled 17 year old went off in a huge Ram truck with instructions to call me when he was on the way home so that I could pick him back up.  He was left off at the door of the MEPS building by the recruiter who couldn't go in with him because of Covid-19 regulations, with instructions to call him when he was done for a ride back to the recruitment center. 

So all day I worried.  I worried that he'd get lost.  Or in an accident.  That he wouldn't know anything on the test.  That he would freeze up or take too long or fail.  That I hadn't done what I should to prepare him for this.

He came back.  He got his scores.  His scores were high enough in all categories that he can basically pick any job in the army that he would want.  He told me that one section would have been impossible if he hadn't taken the robotics course last year.  One section he knew almost everything because he had spent so much time watching car videos (not part of my curriculum!).  He wasn't sure about human biology (which he never took), but scored very high on the science test anyway.  

So what was the use of all of my worries?  I had no idea as I was planning curriculum each year that he would want to enlist in the Army.  He didn't either.  Even if I had known, I wouldn't have had the least idea what to do about it.  But God knew.  He made sure that Rory had the information and the skills that he would need to do what he was meant to do.

We aren't completely done yet.  There is still a physical to get through, and a year of waiting.  But I'm starting to worry a little less.  If God means for Rory to do this, then He will make it happen.  We just need to trust him, and go forward with the process.  And if He doesn't mean for Rory to do this, then all of this preparation is a way to get him where he truly needs to be.

So, to all of you homeschooling parents out there, I want you to know that you're not ruining your kids.  God knows so much better than you, because He can see the end from the beginning.  We just need to trust him day by day.