Last weekend, my family went to attend our son’s senior send-off and graduation celebrations. We had a great time. Seeing his talks and acts, suddenly I realize that he has grown up so much and is soon going to leave us for college. My wife and I have our sentimental moments a little bit.

In the send-off gathering, my son reflected that he is thankful for us to be there all the times and to look after him throughout these years. We are glad to learn that he is a person who knows thanksgiving. We also realize that from now on, it is going to be very difficult for us to be with him all the times “physically” as he is going to be in college. My wife asked him to “call” us, instead of “text-messaging”, whenever he wants to talk to us. At least this way, we can be with him virtually, “on demand” 🙂

In the graduation ceremony, the school counsel gave an enlightened speech. She said, the modern generation “thumb drives” everything from their gadgets and the longest text they can read are only “146 characters”, not 146 words. Therefore, “patience” is one thing that they are definitely lacking. Thus, she challenged the graduates to have patience in dealing with everything.  As she is in a profession of counseling people, she also challenged them to meet people and to talk to them face to face whenever is possible, don’t just text-messaging. This way they can know others better and improve relationship with them. In the course of making any decision, she advised the graduates to “think twice and cut once”, as this is her father’s advice, because a reckless decision can be costly afterwards – including time, money and people relationship. I think the counsel gave them some good advices and challenges. I do hope that they can learn them by heart.

In my own experience, school life is one of the best years in my life. With young and energetic physical and inquisitive mind, it is always a blast for me to meet new friends and to learn new things. As I grew older, I find my learning curve starts to flatten out. One thing I finally realize is:  “Knowing people is more important than learning knowledge”.  As the school counsel indicated, it is the frequent interaction builds good relationship and therefore creates a good people networking. This lets me remember an old saying, “在家靠父母，出外靠朋友 i.e. Friends are as important as parents when you are away from home.”

That being said, from my experience, there is no way, even our best friend, can be with us “all the times”.  The only exception I learned is our Lord, as He is omnipresent. Apostle Paul, in his journey to Athens, indicated to the people of Athens that God is not far from any one of us (Acts 17:27b) when we really want to seek Him. The author of the book Hebrews also taught us that we could come before God’s throne with confidence to receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. (Hebrews 4:16). What a great comfort to learn the promise.

As I encouraged my son to stay in connection with people and making friends in college, I also encouraged him to find a good Christian fellowship to continue his journey with God. I feel this is the only guarantee that he can survive from today’s peer pressure and numerous temptations. As I am certain that knowing the Lord is the most important thing in one’s life and I urge you, my friends, come to know Him personally and He will be with you “all the times”.