HELPING CHILDREN GROW

HELPING CHILDREN GROW

  • Hearing God's Voice, Playing in the Kingdom

HELPING CHILDREN GROW

The kids all gave prophetic words to the members of my new class. Emma could not join us, so she wrote out some cards and asked me to hand them out. The kids did a great job, and the words were powerful. I handed one of the cards to a mom and noticed during the meeting she was quiet, almost timid, and felt like maybe she wouldn’t be coming back.

After class, she was brave enough to approach me and asked for clarification on Emma’s word. Emma wrote many powerful things about this woman’s child, but there was a line where Emma wrote, “The enemy is coming to take your child out.” This poor mom was mortified, scared, and confused. Normally that would be a word to FLUSH and not partner with, but since I know Emma’s history and that she hears God so well, I asked the mom to put a pause button on the word and give me time to talk to Emma when I got home. I immediately asked her if she remembered the word, and she began to say, “Oh yes, I haven’t forgotten about it. Mom, that lady’s child is so powerful, and God is growing and training them now in childhood for their calling. It is really powerful. I saw the enemy trying to bump them off track and get them to lay down their calling because they are so discouraged…” I asked her if she knew what the term ‘take them out’ meant, and she gasped, realizing what she had written. She meant the enemy was trying to take them out of their lane, not ‘take them out’ as in death.

While my daughter heard a very powerful word (which included a strategy for the mother to help her child stay encouraged), she clearly missed it on the delivery. No parent would be encouraged to hear the enemy was trying to ‘take out’ their child. Sometimes we have to cover our children as they are growing and learning. It is okay to make mistakes when we are there to catch them and help them process and grow in their capacity. Parents should be a safe place for children to play in the Kingdom.

LET’S ASK JESUS

“Jesus, will You show me a picture of something You did for me yesterday?”

Gather as a family in the living room, in the car, at the dinner table, or at bedtime, and ask Jesus together. This is empowering for children because it gives you a chance to model how you communicate with God, increase their faith, and encounter Him as a family. Spiritual hearing is a muscle that is strengthened over time, such as worshiping and praying. The more you do it, the stronger you become at it.

GOD CALLING

Want to try something fun? Set a reminder to go off on your phone and stop whenever you are, even if it means at a friend’s house or in a store, and ask God, “How do You feel about me right now?” This is a great way to increase your spiritual hearing and allow Him to meet you right where you are at. Do it with the kids and allow them to practice hearing from Him too.

HE DOESN’T HEAR

I feel the need to share that when we started practicing hearing God’s voice ourselves, some kids got it really fast, while others took longer. At times, I started to feel pressured or would believe the lie that they weren’t getting it, but, like reading, once it clicked, they took off. Is it really a tool we want to risk backing off just because it might take them a little longer than we think it should? Also, for Hudson, I kept saying, “What did you HEAR?” and he would say nothing. Finally, I realized that something was going on and asked God to show me what it was. I realized that he wasn’t ‘hearing’ anything but ‘seeing’ pictures. Once I changed my verbiage to, “What did you get?”, he instantly started ‘hearing’. I urge you not to worry or get too caught up in the process, but I do encourage you to keep sowing into it. When a parent laments that their two-year-old isn’t getting it, I smile and encourage them to keep practicing because when they are three, they are going to be further along than most thirty-year-olds. 

Children hear without filters and the fear of man, and they are void of a religious spirit or awareness of social etiquette. Their ears are pure, and we need to protect them. They have the ability to hear quickly. We need to trust what they are hearing. The Spirit taught me that if I was going to teach my children to hear Father God, I had to guard against positioning myself as the middleman. This can be a hard place for a mama to rest in, but I do not want to create a dependency upon me whenever my kids hear Holy Spirit whispering to them. If what they hear seems a little fishy or self-motivated, do NOT call that out, as it could squelch their listening ears. Instead, treat it like practicing their ABC’s. A lack of perfection doesn’t mean they shouldn’t try it again, nor do you make them feel bad for missing the letter M. It means that they must keep practicing. If it wasn’t the Lord, I promise He will organize the circumstances to reveal that in a teachable moment. The only time I get to test if the word they say is from God is if it truly is out of line with the Scriptures. Tread with grace as they are exercising their spiritual muscles and seek not to shut them down.

If your child is not interested in practicing, I question two things: #1. Have you spent enough time teaching it to them? Kids who feel like Mom/Dad expect something from them (hearing Jesus) but do not understand what you mean will shut down out of fear of disappointing you. #2. Are you making it FUN? The Kingdom is righteousness, peace, and JOY and if it isn’t FUN, then you are most likely partnering with a religious spirit of expectation or performance.

TUNING YOUR HEARING

I was coaching a mom whose daughter was believing lies about herself. When the mom asked her to ask Jesus, she said, “I don’t hear Him speaking to me.” The mom went on to say she hears Him well when she worships and isn’t sure how to help her ‘hear.’ I encouraged her to have her daughter take the statement she believed about herself and turn it into a song. If it was life-giving, brought peace, and one that people would sing at Church, she could be assured it was a true statement about herself. If the church wouldn’t adopt her song, neither should she. Oh, baby girl, your spiritual ears work just fine!!

WHO IS YOUR AUDIENCE?

One night we drove through our old community, walking down memory lane. There is something so fun about hearing your child’s childhood memories. I pulled into the DQ drive-thru to continue our ‘remember when’ discussion. Across the street from the DQ is a large lake that people walk around. And I was undone by a particular memory and how it shaped my family. Years ago, when the kids were all under seven years old, I read a book about the children in Africa and how they were sad they didn’t have unity amongst the believers and decided to do something about it. I was interrupted with questions about our own community as Holy Spirit was stirring something up in my children for the unity of their own town. I began to ask them questions about what we should do. I let it be 100% led by them. They wanted to write to all of the church leaders and invite them to a unity prayer walk around the lake, which we did. They prayed over the envelopes before mailing them. They wanted to make prayer signs and put them around the lake for things to pray for (unity, the leaders, and families). They wanted to unite the believers as lovers of Jesus despite their differences. God gave us a glorious sunny day; they walked their little legs around the whole lake and hammered the stakes into the ground. And waited and waited. In the course of five hours, only FIVE people showed up. One stopped along the way and appeared to be reading the signs and responding. Three walked right by and didn’t even notice. They watched from the other side of the lake as one took the time to destroy each of their signs, tossing them on the ground. As we walked around the lake to pick up our trashed signs, I felt such a profound mix of utter discouragement and disappointment but an odd sense of growing JOY. We endured a silent car ride home as I cried out to the Lord to show me how to steward the events with the children who so clearly were led by Him and cared about the unity of their community. I called a family meeting to allow them to process. They did not see a lack in their efforts but a lack of unity, which was all that mattered. They began to pray with an incredible passion for their city. The Lord spoke to me later and said, as a mother, I can’t use the measuring stick of FRUIT or QUANTITY in training my children to follow Him. The ONLY thing that matters is OBEDIENCE! We obeyed whether the entire community showed up or none. We followed HIS leading, which paved the way for us to respond to His voice countless times over the years to impact our community. It taught us that we live for an audience of ONE. 

CHILDREN CAN HEAR GOD’S VOICE TOO!

“I’ve been teaching JD to hear God’s voice so today before we went into the grocery store, I asked him to pray and ask Jesus who He wanted him to show His love to. He said he wanted to draw a picture of different color flowers and also a picture of heaven and earth being connected. So I let him draw and we went in the store. When we were inside, I told him to ask Jesus who He wanted him to give it to and he pointed to the lady walking by in the flower department. I just thought it was because she was the first person he saw so I told him to keep praying. We went down a few aisles and I reminded him to keep listening to Jesus about who to give it to and he said, ‘I think I need to now,’ but there was no one around so he ran off to look. He came running back very excited and said, ‘Where’s my picture? I have an idea.’ I then followed him all around the store looking for someone. I said, ‘Are you looking for someone specific?’ and he said ‘Yeah, the first lady I saw in the flowers.’ Then it all made since to me because flowers were the first thing he said God showed him in the car. So we went back and found her, and he handed it to her and told her what the drawing was and then when I told her that it was for her, that he had prayed and heard God telling him to give it to her, she immediately started tearing up. She said she was praying on her way to work because she just has all of the stuff going on in her life right now and that that made her day. She said she was going in for surgery the day after tomorrow, so we were able to lay hands on her and pray for her. As we were walking away, JD saw this weird flower filler thing and said, ‘That’s my favorite color!’ A few minutes later she found us in the store and gave those to him and told him how much his message meant to her. Moral of the story is that children can hear God’s voice too and their simple childlike faith has the power to transform lives. If you have children try this game with them. It’s so much fun!!”

FOLLOW HIS VOICE

My friend woke in the early morning to have a sudden desire to check her phone (that was GOD speaking to her). She clicked on a message from a friend, and it almost read like a goodbye letter (the check in her spirit was Holy Spirit). The friend went offline, and she didn’t have her phone number. She got up and asked a mutual friend to call their friend right away. She didn’t answer the phone. My friend told her to call her husband, who confirmed his wife was still in bed sleeping. My friend wrote back, “No, have the husband go check on his wife.” (Holy Spirit was alerting her spirit). The friend called the husband again with instructions to check on her. He realized the door was locked and, after barging in, found that his wife had hung herself and was able to save her within seconds of her passing. God knew He could wake my friend from a deep sleep and that she would respond to His leading. It saved a little three-year-old girl from losing her mom that day. Hearing your Father is a lifeline to you and those around you!

JESUS LOVES HIM

Someone was supposed to drop something off at the house but called to say they were running late because he had many screws in his back, which made it nearly impossible to move fast during the cold Colorado weather. I told the kids about the delay, and they all said we should pray for him when he comes. He was such a sweet guy, but I could tell he had a story. He mentioned that his wife had just died in her sleep. I invited him in so the kids could pray for him. While he said he didn’t believe in God, he was willing to let the kids pray for him. They bossed that back pain around like there was no tomorrow! So bold and confident in what they believe. He came in all hunched over, and by the time he left, he was standing up straight. I know more than anything he felt loved by us, which was evident by his spark of joy and desire to keep talking. I bless that man and will continue to pray for his broken heart.