Jeri's Mountain

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight"

(Proverbs 3:5-6)

This Biblical passage is so familiar to so many people, even when they’re not readers of the Bible, yet we so often forget these powerful words. God wants us to trust Him in all that we do, submit ALL of our problems to Him and allow Him to guide us on the path we should take.

Mountain

When I was immature in faith I knew this scripture (Proverbs 3:5-6), but little did I know, the power of this verse and how important it would be to my life. As a parent, I’ve gone through and grown through so many different stages. As a new parent and single mother, I was timid and afraid to make any mistakes. I realized that God trusted me with two little humans that depended on me and I had no idea how to care for them. Sure, I read books on parenting. In fact, I read too many to count. In reading those books, I noticed that everyone’s journey is different, we are all unique individuals, and parenting perspectives vary from person to person. Yet, each book that I read gave me small nuggets of wisdom that I would try to use for my ever-changing twins. I quickly realized that although these books had their purpose and provided me bits of insight, there was one book….one POWERFUL book that I was overlooking.

The Bible.

I knew the Lord, grew up in the church and still failed to use it consistently when parenting. That’s until life gave me no choice! See, as a parent I tackled conflict as it came. I tried to run my house in the best way possible. I had to play the role of the nurturer and disciplinarian. I often complained about the complexities of being the single parent of twins with two incredibly strong but different personalities. I was adamant about setting standards, rules, and treating them equally. I didn’t consider how dynamic their needs were–they required different types of attention and they responded differently to various types of reinforcement techniques. For many years I thought I was succeeding in parenting, until life knocked me to my knees.

Now, I will say that along the way there were several challenges, but we faced them and did our best to fix them as they came. Nevertheless, no one could prepare me for the attitudes of the teenage years!! I went from having two little best friends to MEAN-agers who quickly added the DIS to the foundation of respect!! In fact, they were beyond DISrespectful at times.

There were too many times where I was punishing my children for every little comment made, every breakdown in communication, every attitude, argument, bad grade etcetera…Until I realized that I was making my children miserable. We were both miserable. In a heated debate, my daughter (the dominant twin) with tears in her eyes said, “You never have genuine conversations with me. You ONLY tell me what I am doing wrong!” I immediately became defensive and mentioned that I not only talk to her, but she has everything that she wants and needs. She then stated, “You buy us stuff, but you only have time to work and yell.” A few weeks later, my son had a similar breakdown and his complaint was that I expected him to do everything and he felt like he could never do anything right. He even said that he was going to stop trying. I was so appalled, conflicted, and ultimately devastated! The disciplinarian in me was angry because I would’ve never made these comments to my parents, no matter how upset I became. I found it disrespectful that they lacked the self control and emotional maturity to refrain from these outbursts. I was over it!

I went to my room, closed the door after both breakdowns and cried. I couldn’t figure out where I was going wrong. Had I not nurtured them and supplied a solid foundation of love? I began crying out to God and asking why? What did I do so wrong to deserve such disrespectful brats? (Don’t judge me, but these were my exact words). A little voice said you aren’t leaning on me… you think you know better. You aren’t trusting me to guide you through parenting. You are taking on problems you are ONLY equipped to handle with me…but you aren’t allowing me to guide you and fight these battles with you.

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Message

It was that moment that convicted me. Our ALL powerful, ALL knowing Father knows all of our parenting needs. He knows what our children need. We have to depend on Him, and when we don’t, we get lost on our journey. See, I was trying my hardest to raise these kids alone when I had help all along that I wasn’t fully using! I was training these kids like they were my pets. If they were good they’d get a new toy/outfit/shoes/treat and pat on the back. I wanted to groom them to be these great adults, when they barely knew how to be kids. They were yearning for so much more than I alone can provide!

This revelation pushed me to pray more consistently with them, guide them closer to God, and rely on God for direction. I let them know that I’m human and I’m learning everyday, just like them. I will not always get parenting right. We will both make mistakes, but we have to communicate how we can better navigate future occurrences to diminish the probability of making the same mistakes without learning. My transparency was helpful because they now realize that I am not above taking accountability for my actions. God forgives me for my wrongs, he forgives them, and so do I. Everyday is a new day to be better than yesterday. We will celebrate the wins and learn from our losses. We are now talking more through our feelings and problems, as well as taking accountability and responsibility for our shortcomings as well as scheduling intimate time with one another doing things that we both find enjoyable and fulfilling. The devil tried it with my teenagers…it won’t be the last time, but I’m trusting God with ALL of my heart. I’m no longer leaning on my understanding! I’m submitting my ALL to Him and allowing Him to guide my path and the path of my children!