The unexpected journey: a path to manhood

My son had made it through the initial rite of passage being the spiritual element of memorizing certain scriptures, building a relationship with God and leading a bible lesson. Our second and third rites of passage—the mental and physical—were to happen in tandem. We would enter the Halls of Knowledge by reading three different books while preparing for the physical rites of passage of being in the outdoors hunting, fishing and camping. Three unexpected enemies appeared on the scene. The amount of time, energy and effort it takes to start an insurance business is not at all unlike that of starting a brick and mortar business. This meant that we had to alter our times of meeting as well as the length of our involvement. I struggled with this because it meant that I could not give my son my full attention as I had when we first began. The second enemy to rear its ugly head was finances. Since my business was a commissioned only business, if I did not produce, I was not paid. This meant that the physical part of journey had to be put on hold. The reserve money necessary to begin such a position had been spent on starting a new business the year before. This brought some disappointment to both of us because anticipated outings could not take place. This lead to the third enemy revealing himself— emotions. The combination of the other two helped to create a giant of a foe that openly stood before me in stanch defiance. Added to this were the approaching holidays. It took a toll on me as well as our time together. I asked me son to put this thoughts down concerning these challenges of our journey. What follows are his words—with minor grammatical adjustments. When we first started the journey is was not exactly easy. I did not want to wake up in the mornings but eventually I kind of got used to it… sort of. But anyways that part was pretty easy. After the Spiritual Rite of Passage was over went right to the Mental Rite of Passage and that is when we kind of…slacked off. We had three books: 1. The Divine Mentor (a very good book in learning from the mistakes mentors did in the Bible.) 2. A Tale of Three Kings (Similar to The Divine Mentor but more focused on three kings: King Saul, King David, and King Absalom. One thing in that book that stood out is it asks, “Are you a Saul or a David?” just a little something for you to ponder over.) 3. The Shack (A book about how to trust God in hard times.) Which leads me to where we are right now. We are in a hard time and I probably shouldn’t tell much, so lets just say we are not sure where God wants us to be right now. It’s been really hard for my parents, but not exactly that hard for my siblings and me. For us we don’t know exactly what to think. My dad said (translated into my own words) that there are two sides at battle, one’s spiritual and one’s emotional. Here’s what he thinks. One side is he’s sort-of-scared and confused, the other side, however, is excited and just waiting to see where God will take us. For me, personally, I’m excited and just goin’- with-the-flow. And that pretty much is it. We did not make it in time to do any of the Physical Rites of Passage because my birthday is two days and I don’t think we can go camping, hunting and fishing in just two days. Plus it’s not hunting season and that kinda puts a halt to things.