Romans 5:3-4 tells us, “More than that, we rejoice in our trials, knowing that trials produce perseverance, and perseverance produces character, and character produces hope.”
We live in the safest age in history. Every year businesses market products designed to protect children from every kind of malady imaginable. As a new parent I am overwhelmed by the onslaught of warnings for my children. You can verify with my wife, I can be a bit neurotic when it comes to my kids’ safety, but have we as a society gone too far? Do we as parents protect to the extent that our children do not know how to get up and dust themselves off because we have never allowed them the opportunity to get knocked down?
One guarantee in life is that we will all have trials. A pastor friend once told me, “Everyone is either walking out of a trial, in the midst of a trial, or walking into a trial.”
In school it is the same thing. However, as a student matures the trials become more difficult, more severe and the consequences are greater. Getting pushed on the playground or getting picked last for the team is hard to handle, but it pales in comparison to the trials that teenagers face today. While it seems counterintuitive, trials and suffering are an essential aspect in our spiritual development – thus, we must step back and allow them to happen. According to Romans there is no shortcut. The process of developing character and, ultimately, hope requires that we do not circumvent the process of learning to deal with trials. God’s primary concern is building character and hope, and more specifically, the character of Christ and hope in the eternal that does not disappoint.
So what is CPA’s role in this? Our mission is to “assist Christian families in helping students come to know God and evaluate all knowledge and life by His truth and live lives transformed for His glory.” Our desire is to walk alongside our students as they face various trials and help facilitate their growth by loving them, challenging them and encouraging them in mercy and love. “We are more than conquerors through Him who loves us.” Romans 8:37