This is a question so many people wonder about/ponder/debate. If God loves me, why doesn’t He heal me?! If God has all the power in the world, why doesn’t He change a particular aspect of our lives? Why doesn’t He cure cancer, or AIDS, or autism? And right now, the answer is - I don’t know. When I think about it, I wish He would…I wish that those who are suffering would not have to suffer. I wish that those whose minds are not clear could have clarity of thought.This question took on a whole new meaning tonight. When you throw developmental issues, trust issues, anxiety, a strong adherence to rules, a definite cause-effect sequence that should not be sabotaged, and sensory issues, into the mix, it becomes extremely difficult to provide a meaningful answer to this question.Picasso has a wart on his toe. That’s a pretty common occurrence these days, for a person to have a wart. I think it’s the first one we’ve dealt with in nearly 11 years of parenting: not too bad! However, Picasso also has extreme sensory issues, anxiety, trust issues, as well as a strict adherence to rules (I did “X” so “Y” should happen), and cause-effect sequences (if I use words then someone listens to me). His wart was very nearly out of his toe and so tonight I was trying to get most of it out. That ended up being a thousand times easier said, than done.
He’s started doing something new in these tough situations - he’s been praying and asking God to help him. What I did not really know before tonight, was that he’s been asking God to heal him - as in “zap! you’re healed!” So tonight, as I was checking his toe, after he had prayed, he got totally out of control. He was flailing (due to the sensory issues), screaming at me, crying, kicking (all due to the reasons listed in the paragraph above) - anything to get my hands off his feet. When he finally caught his breath, he hollered at me, while crying, “I PRAYED AND ASKED GOD TO HEAL ME AND HE’S NOT DOING IT AND I DON’T KNOW WHY HE ISN’T ANSWERING MY PRAYER!”
What do you say? What would you say to a child who is typically developing and can understand a routine conversation? Maybe something like, “Well, God gives us doctors and scientists who can make great medicines for us.” I tried that. Didn’t work. Or maybe, “We need to get this taken care of so we don’t have to see the doctor to get the wart out.” I said that, too. None of it helped. This child was not going to have anything less than a direct answer to his direct question - one which would directly satisfy his frustration/fear/pain.
What do you say in those moments? I quietly let go of his foot. I looked him square in the eye and quietly breathed my own prayer for something that would soothe him, and that would provide a direct answer to his direct frustration. “Honey, sometimes God doesn’t answer the way we want Him to. But I think in this situation, He’s giving you an opportunity to trust Mommy.” A quiet moment…he was reflecting on my answer. I thought I might have succeeded…a glimmer of hope!
Then, the tears: “I’VE BEEN ASKING, AND ASKING, AND ASKING, AND HE’S JUST NOT ANSWERING ME!”
What do you say? How do you explain God and His ability to answer prayer, and His seeming non-answer, to a kid who already sees things so very differently than the rest of us? Is it fair to say, “Just trust me” when I’ve spent years telling him that he can trust God, and now it seems that God is not coming through for him?
The wart is mostly gone - we worked through his anxiety and his fear and pain and let him check his own toe. However, I’m pretty confident in the fact that I did not answer my son sufficiently, according to his needs. I tried. But given all of the issues this child deals with, I don’t know that it’s an answer he can understand and internalize in what he believes to be a crisis situation. I have tried explaining tough things in quiet moments, and it seems to work - but the questions come back in the crisis situations.
How do you make them understand the things they cannot understand - the things we cannot understand? How do you pass along trust to someone who has to learn to trust rather than being able to innately trust?
Matthew 19:14 ~ Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”
This breaks my heart, and I don’t have any good answers. The only suggestions I can think of are showing him - in you - someone he can trust, since children often learn to trust God, at least initially, in the ways that they’ve learned to trust Mom and Dad (i.e. you’re there, you don’t abandon him, you answer questions, you seek his best, and so on). And I already see in this post that you are modeling prayer for him and teaching him about it, which would be my other thought.
And I also think it’s good to remember that we - as moms - can trust God, even when we don’t have the answers. Especially when we don’t have the answers!
If you would ever be interested in guest blogging at my special needs ministry blog, let me know! I saw that you wrote follow-up posts for my friend Amy’s series on mothers of children with autism, and while my blog isn’t exactly like hers, it is similar in some ways. You can check it out at The Works of God Displayed, and - if you’d be willing to talk more about a guest post or anything else - my email is shannon AT theworksofgoddisplayed DOT com.
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This breaks my heart, and I don’t have any good answers. The only suggestions I can think of are showing him - in you - someone he can trust, since children often learn to trust God, at least initially, in the ways that they’ve learned to trust Mom and Dad (i.e. you’re there, you don’t abandon him, you answer questions, you seek his best, and so on). And I already see in this post that you are modeling prayer for him and teaching him about it, which would be my other thought.
And I also think it’s good to remember that we - as moms - can trust God, even when we don’t have the answers. Especially when we don’t have the answers!
If you would ever be interested in guest blogging at my special needs ministry blog, let me know! I saw that you wrote follow-up posts for my friend Amy’s series on mothers of children with autism, and while my blog isn’t exactly like hers, it is similar in some ways. You can check it out at The Works of God Displayed, and - if you’d be willing to talk more about a guest post or anything else - my email is shannon AT theworksofgoddisplayed DOT com.
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And I haven’t read your blog long enough to know if these suggestions would work, but have Social Stories been helpful for Picasso? If so, I’m wondering if writing one about prayer could help, though prayer isn’t as concrete of a concept as some of the social stories I’ve used or written in the past so that might not work.
And would talking about biblical characters help him, since it would give a specific example of a more abstract concept? For example, Joseph, who didn’t get the positive answer right away but who God was able to use in powerful ways because of that.
Once again, I haven’t gotten to know Picasso well enough to know if those suggestions are off base - just thinking out loud! More than anything, I think the “do not hinder them” part of the verse you ended with is key. We may not always have answers that seem helpful, but sometimes I think the doctor’s creed of “first, do no harm” is a good one. I’d love to help every child I work with understand God, but when that doesn’t happen on a certain Sunday, I - at minimum - strive not to hinder their faith in any way. (And since there are certainly things I don’t understand about God, it makes sense that my kids and the kids I work with at my church don’t always get it either!)
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