This has been an interesting week with the passing and funeral of my stepdad, which brought a lot of people together who have their personal set of issues. Also, it is the end of my last daughter’s college softball career, plus her commencement ceremony from college in less than a month.

Both scenarios bring up one question, and that has to do with God. Why God, What should I do God, What’s next God? All legitimate questions, but what most people really want to know is whether or not God is present and because we want to believe he is we ask where is he and how do we know.

I write in my book The 7 Principles of Faith-Based Parenting, that God is always in charge, and we are just along for the ride. But it is our choice how we react to those changes. Do we accept them with grace and humility, surrendering to God’s will and embracing the good he intends for us; or, conversely, do we fight those changes, with anger, bitterness, and any host of negative reactions, all of them equally impotent and purposeless?

Whether its change through the death of a love one or the end of playing a 20 year sport, or because of a rite of passage like graduating from college, the one thing we can rely on is the promises God has made to us.

We know God has a plan for us because of Jeremiah 29:11 which states “For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.

And no matter how challenging things are, we know that God gives those who are weak, strength.

Isaiah 40:29-31 He gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless.  Even youths will become weak and tired, and young men will fall in exhaustion.  But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength.  They will soar high on wings like eagles.  They will run and not grow weary.  They will walk and not faint.

And by being faithful, we know the victory is ours.

Romans 8:37 No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us.