Every night we pray with our kids. Its part of our ritual. The kids demand their prayers. One from me and then one from their father. All told 4 prayers ... 2 for each old kid.
Avery loves the "Our Father". She requests it every night. It must not be too slow or too fast. She interrupts at least twice and I lose my place and have to start over. Lately her request has been "the Our Father and then pray for Grandma Mac". Grandma Mac is actually her great grandmother who has been in rehab since having tumors removed from her bladder. Thankfully our prayers are working because she is being discharged to home today, three weeks after her surgery.
Cullen's prayer must have the following included, "help Cullen to have beautiful dreams and no bad ones and to think no bad thoughts". This is because Cullen has a great imagination and if he starts thinking scary thoughts he gets wound up into a tizzy thinking zombies are scratching at his window.
I put little suggestions into his prayers so that he might know he can have a relationship with God by speaking to God directly. So part of the prayer I say for him goes "help Cullen to know that you watch over him and he can turn all his cares to you God. Amen". Last night after I closed the prayer Cullen looked at me and said, "I don't have any cares cause I have you."
If I could have faith in my God like my son has faith in me I would be carefree.
I think back to my childhood and the disappointment and grief I felt when my father left the family. I thought he was a white knight, and a movie star all rolled into well. He would do no wrong in my eyes. His leaving resulted in a brokenness that I still carry. I know children need a strong foundation and sense of security. Life can't touch them with their parents around. It allows them to grow and develop without fear of the outside world. I want that for my kids. I do not want to be the reason they falter and struggle at an early age wondering if they are loved and if they are valued. So I am glad he can say with such certainty that his cares are few with me as his mother.
I also look forward to the day that he can shift that belief over to the God who loves him even more than I can.
3 comments:
How absolutely beautiful and precious Cullen is. I can only imagine what it did to your mother's heart. And it just goes to show that you ARE a wonderful mom and giving him that strong foundation of love and security.
my thoughts exactly, "that's just amazingly beautiful"
you are for sure doing something right
thanks be to God! :-)
You are a very good Mama!
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