Article: Time With the Next Generation

It’s been an eventful weekend in Accra, Ghana. One of the highlights was time spent exercising with a teenager who has been my friend from birth. His father would drop him off with me for the weekend when he was about 3-4 years old.

He is now taller than me and plays for the junior national basketball team of his country. As we went jogging early on Friday morning, he led the charge and I followed closely behind.  Flashbacks of the weekend experience of having him over as a child kept crossing my mind. We truly enjoyed exercising together and had a great prayer walk thereafter.

 I spent the night with a young couple who belong to another generation.  I was involved in studying the Bible with him when he did at the age of 15. He is now a married man and I had the opportunity to sit in a meeting with the team he leads, one that organized the just concluded singles conference in Accra.

I could see myself in him over 15 years ago as he and his wife hosted and encouraged their team of very gifted and committed leaders. It’s amazing to see him live out the dreams he has been nourishing in his heart for God. God has blessed him with an incredible wife who supports his passion for the things of God.

Humbling to look back and realize that younger generations are watching and are being shaped by what they see the older ones do.

Paul could confidently say “follow my example as I follow the example of Christ.”

Who is following our example and what are they imitating? What price are we willing to pay to live a spiritually exemplary life, one that is worthy of emulation? To who are we passing on the torch of true discipleship?

Psalm 22:6; 2 Timothy. 2:2; 1 Timothy 4:12

Gilbert Kimeng