As a child, one of my favorite stories in the Bible was Mephibosheth. There was something fascinating to me about the idea of David honoring a promise to his friend Jonathan. In a time when David would have been considered justified to have killed Mephibosheth as a member of his “opposition”, he basically made Mephibosheth a member of his family. Oh, there were a few hiccups later, but they had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that Mephibosheth had special needs.
Continue reading Why Your Child With Special Needs Has An Important Place in God’s Kingdom
We all know the “age of accountability” for baptism (and thereby becoming a Christian) probably varies slightly from child to child. For years I have watched as the first children in a class study with their parents, decide they want to be baptized and dedicate their lives to Christ. The parents of the other children in their grade start looking forward to the day when their child decides to become a Christian, too.
Perhaps, the scariest thing to me about parenting is the fear of my daughter rejecting God. Many of my parenting decisions were made because I wanted to be able to honestly say I did everything I knew how to do to help her be strong spiritually. And yet there are no guarantees your child will be a faithful, productive Christian as an adult. Or are there?
You may not know this, but Parenting Like Hannah and its parent ministry Teach One Reach One actually began with the writing of a study for parents and Bible class teachers to do with young people who were expressing an interest in being baptized and becoming a Christian. I wrote it, because at the time my own daughter was interested in becoming a Christian and I couldn’t find anything I liked. As we studied together, I crafted the study from what we discussed and the questions she and some of her friends had on the topic.
It happens to us all. We think we are doing something routine like grocery shopping. On a good day I can get in and out of the grocery store in a few minutes. It never fails though. If my day is packed with so much I have little wiggle room, I will run into everyone I haven’t seen for years in the store. And they want to talk. A lot. About everything that has happened in the five years since I last saw them.