Battle of Wills

I sat outside my son's bedroom door for 45 minutes last night while he alternated yelling at me and softly apologizing and pleading with me to let him out.

He wasn't very good at an event last evening.  So as a consequence, he was not going to get ice cream like the rest of my children.  Upon getting this news, he decided to yell the words "Ice Cream" for ten minutes as we drove home from the event.

When we arrived home, I calmly said, "Now you have lost your privilege to stay up any longer (it was 730 anyway so bed time was near).  Go to your room."  He planted his feet into the ground and refused to move and said once again, "ICE CREAM!"  Without a word, I picked him up and carried him to his bedroom.  He grabbed anything we passed trying to stay put or throwing objects at me.  I placed him in his room and said, "You have not respected me this evening and therefore you will pay the consequence."  Then I closed the door.

Almost immediately, he opened it and said, "Haha! I can get out! I'm not staying in here!"  This was going to be a battle of wills, I could tell!  I gently pushed him back from the door and closed it again.  No words, just action.  This time I held the knob so he couldn't open it again.

He screamed at me about how I was an awful mom.  He kicked and punched the door, threw some toys at it too.  Then laid down on the floor and spoke to me from under the door. "Mommy, I want a hug and a kiss."  Trying to pull on my heartstrings, I see.

"You may come out and give me a hug and a kiss but then you will go back in and pay your consequence."

"But I am apologizing!  Please forgive me!"

"I forgive you, son, but you will still have to pay the consequence for your actions."

More screaming at me and hitting the door, more pleading for me to give in.

When he finally calmed down and it was evident he would stay in his room with out me sitting by the door, I opened it and said, "Son, God tells us in the Bible to respect our mothers.  You have had a hard time with that tonight and a lot lately.  You need to know that I will not tolerate that.  We all make mistakes, and luckily, God forgives us when we ask for forgiveness.  And God has also told us to forgive others as he has forgiven us, so I forgive you too.  But we still have to pay our consequences so we learn from our actions."

"Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." Ephesians 6:1

I'm proud of myself.  It took 45 minutes but he finally realized I wasn't going to just let him go.  And even more over, I didn't raise my voice or do anything that was mean/harmful.  I just stood my ground.  I prayed through the whole happening.  "God, give me strength to stand firm."

After the whole ordeal, I was completely exhausted. I got the other three kids up in their beds and then sat down at the computer to write about it and just started bawling.  I prayed some more, "God, give me a sign that I did the right thing."

And on Facebook, a few posts down on my newsfeed, was this:

"It may be hard, but the greater the difficulty, the greater the reward. When you sow a radical seed of obedience, you will reap a radical reward." --Joel Osteen Ministries

I let out a sigh of relief, and through my tears, thanked God for telling me what I needed to hear at that moment.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Last night, I was tucking my kids into bed.  As always they were each calling me back to their room for more attention, so I went between the three rooms with various conversations, stopping to pick books up in the hallway, found a pair of discarded jammie bottoms, and then closed each door.  As I did that, I noticed my daughter had put a new sign up on her door.  It simply reads: "Revelations 3:20"

Since I don't have the bible memorized I had to look it up:

"Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me."

She made me smile.

The last month and a half have been some of the hardest times of my life.  And through it all I am working so hard to walk back to God.  In doing so, I'm reading the bible constantly, praying about everything, and doing what God wants me to do in all things.  I've asked God to guide me and use me.

My kids have seen what I am doing.  Last week, my daughter found a kids' devotional book that I had bought for her at a yard sale two years ago.  Knowing how I read several devotionals a day, she asked if we could read it together each night.  The first night only she and her oldest brother joined.  The next night all four of them wanted to listen and to hear me pray.

She's begun falling asleep with the bible in her hands as she is fervently trying to read and understand God's word.  She's not understanding it yet, but that's not what matters.  What matters is the willingness to want to be God's child and to do what God is telling us to do.

I couldn't be prouder each night when I check on each of the kids when I go to bed.  They are all snuggled up in their beds snoozing away.  And there she is sleeping peacefully with the bible in her hands.  Through all of this hurting I am going through right now, God is using me to work on these precious children of mine.  Thank you, God!