When You Fear You’ve Lost Your Kids

by Regina Williams

Nothing completely prepared me for parenting . . . not really. I read books, I watched how other moms parented, I listened to teaching, I went to retreats and conferences. I must say, now that I’m on the other side of raising my children, parenting stretched my faith like nothing else. I’ve gone through a lot in my life, growing up in a family where my mom was an alcoholic, my dad was absent for the most part, loosing our home during my teen years, having breast cancer, not just once, but twice. All of those trials God used in my life to grow my faith and dependence on Him. But what really drove me to my knees was having one of my sons, Barry, walk away from the Lord and close himself off from us.

Beginning in his eighth grade year I saw Barry start to pull away from us. Some of that is normal, and since we have an older son, we understood that. He became hard to communicate with and it seemed all our conversations became one of instruction and correction. There was no joy in the relationship. It was just HARD! By the time he was a junior, I felt like we were in full spiritual battle for his soul! Even though he had asked Jesus into his heart at seven years old, there was a battle going on. As the years went on and the battle grew more intense, God confirmed this was a spiritual battle.So what do you do when you’re in the midst of hard parenting days and years?

Here’s what I learned:

1. Remember whose children they are . . . God’s.

We are just temporary stewards of them. God chose you to be their mom. He promised to provide you with everything you need to parent each child.

2. Seek the Lord.

Parenting is very draining – emotionally, physically, and spiritually. Make sure you’re allowing His Word to fill your mind with His truth and perspective. It is so important to listen to the Lord. I made it a priority to spend time each day with the Lord, reading His Word, listening for His encouragement and wisdom. Ps. 46:10 says, “Be still, and know that I am God.” As I spent time listening, two key things He said to me:

•  Trust Him. He desired to grow my faith through this.
• Focus on what He’s already done in my son’s life, and not just on what He needs to do. I needed to encourage Barry with truth about who he is. While my son was away at college, I felt the Lord said to write him weekly, saying something positive about him – how I saw Jesus in him – and burying a scripture verse in the letter. At that time, I was not sure he was even reading the letters. I was just being obedient to what the Lord asked me to do.

3. Pray diligently

4. Focus on building the relationship with your child

But make sure you don’t try to fill the gaps in their lives that only God can fill. You can’t change your child’s heart, but God can! As my son became more and more miserable with his life, he started calling us and opening up to us. We were always there for him, and he knew that. We made it a priority to keep our relationship healthy with him. We wanted him to know we would always be there for him. I knew he was searching, but because God had made him very sensitive and compassionate, he struggled with Jesus being the only way to salvation. We wanted him to wrestle with this, and not just put Jesus on the shelf. When he would come home from college, I’d ask if he would give me an hour of his time. I would have a message from our pastor on a CD ready for us to listen together. Our pastor was such a great communicator (Andy Stanley). My son would listen and could understand what was being said. God was planting seeds.