"Do not embitter your children, or they will become discouraged." -Colossians 3:21
In Week 10, Karen Kingsbury tells the story of a mother who tries to encourage her to son to break free from a friendship she believes isn't healthy for him. This friendship ends up being the one that saves her son's life. It's important to note that when his father was alive he would tell the mother that he feels that their son's friend is a positive person in his life. Instead of praying over their friendship and letting God's Will take over, she tried to force her feelings on their friendship on their son which almost ended up costing him his life. The mistake this mom made was trying to take matters into her own hands instead of waiting on God for His directions on which path to take.
As parents, it's very hard for us let go of what we think our children need and allow God to do what He needs in their lives. Add in special needs, and we are desperately searching for the way to help our children. Searching so much it wears us down to total chaos, stress, worry and desperation. We can't understand why it's not working. Why is my child still sick? Why aren't these treatments helping like I thought it would? Why can't my child make a friend? These words will be in our heads all day long and keep breaking us down until we can no longer function and hit a stage of depression. That's not what God wants and it's definitely not what our children need.
God wants us and needs us to be the parents he created us to be. What if the answer to what you are searching for is you? What if the one thing that your child needs is a parent who is not anxious, not stressed, and not worried? What if the one thing your child needs is a parent whose total faith through all of this is in God and what He will do to help?
God wants us to bring our needs to Him. He wants us to ask Him for help and most importantly, wait for His help. You see, the mom in Karen Kingsbury's devotion for Week 10 didn't wait for help. In our scripture reading for this week (Genesis 27) Rebekah didn't wait for God to move in their lives. She took matter into her own hands. The New Living Translation of the Life Application Bible says this in regards to Genesis 27:5-10:
When Rebekah learned that Isaac was preparing to bless Esau, she quickly devised a plan to trick him into blessing Jacob instead Although God had already told her that Jacob would become the family leader, Rebekah took matters into her own hands. She resorted to doing something wrong to try to bring about what God had already said would happen. For Rebekah, the end justified the means. No matter how good we think our goals are, we should not attempt to achieve them by doing what is wrong. Would God approve of the methods you are using to accomplish your goals?
As I've mentioned before in previous posts, I'm not saying to stop researching, stop all therapies and schooling. This is very important for us to do. All I'm saying is give it to God. Pray about it. Keep researching however, when you reach that point of confusion, chaos, worry and stress, wait for God. Wait for Him to move in your life and show you which path your child needs to be on. It's hard for us to wait. Believe me I get it. But I can tell you after 8 years of different paths I've taken my son on because I thought it was right thing to do, if I would have waited for God to direct my paths we would have had a much easier road. I have recently started looking and waiting for the path that God wants us to take. It's so much easier, more peaceful and a lot more rewarding.
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