How great is the lovingkindness of God, that He permits us to approach Him with such requests. You call Him Father, and in that word you unveil the whole treasure of blessings. For when you name Him Father, you show yourself to be His son through the grace of Christ. This is no small thing, we who were enemies and disgraced have all at once become saints and sons. And because this is so, you have rightly placed your prayer in the hands of the Son. When you close by saying "in Jesus' name," you confess that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. For whatever great things we say of the Son pass on to the Father, and whenever the Son is glorified, the Father is glorified also.
You ask that God guide your son, grant him wisdom and favor, and surround him with peace and comfort during this process. Observe carefully the kind of wisdom and peace you seek. The wisdom of this world, which terminates here and proceeds no further, is foolishness before God. It is not able even here to profit its possessors. But we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the wisdom that has been hidden and which God foreordained before the worlds unto our glory. This is the wisdom granted to those who walk not by the sight of present advantages but by faith in the crucified Lord. Do not suppose that favor from God must always take the shape of an easy path. He who loves us wishes to bestow a favor, and yet He arranges that He might seem to be indebted to us. Consider the patriarch Abraham. God purposed to give His own Son for us, but that He might not seem to bestow a mere favor, He commanded Abraham to offer his son, so that while doing a great kindness He might seem to repay a debt. So too in your son’s life, God’s guidance may lead through trials, but His purpose is always love, always a deeper union of the soul to Himself.
The peace you request is not the peace of this world, which is often an evil agreement among those conspiring in mischief. The peace which Christ gives comes when the diseased is cut off and the mutinous is removed, when the heart is brought into humble subjection to the Father’s will. It is the peace announced by the angels: glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will. If you truly desire this for your son, then do not seek first for him an untroubled life, but rather that he may be found perfect and complete, wanting nothing, walking in the wisdom that is from above.
Finally, take confidence in the One to whom you pray. The Father gave His own Son for us all. How shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? The Son is not ignorant of your son’s needs; in Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. He knows the day and the hour of every deliverance. Your task is to continue in that address which brings countless blessings, holding fast the grace in which you stand. So pray without ceasing, but let your prayer rise not in anxiety but in thanksgiving, for He who began a good work in your son will be faithful to complete it. And let your own life be the first sermon he hears, a life marked by the peace which passes understanding, so that seeing your example he may learn that the one who loves does not wish to command but rather is obliged when he is ruled by God. May this be the true wisdom and favor granted to him, and through him, glory to the Father.