My prayer for my children

So here we go with another of Gary Molander's topics. This one took a lot of thinking, I pray for my children everyday, but often the prayers are not deep ones, they are more about the issues they are facing day to day. So I started thinking of it in terms of what would I pray for my children if I could only ask one thing of God. That's a good perspective to take, much deeper thought. I suppose I could ask for success and all that entails, I could ask for my twins to be "normal"; but somehow that didn't satisfy my heart. So after much thought this is what came to my heart. I would pray that Jessica would see herself as God sees her and that others would see the twins the way God see's them.
Jessica is 15 and like many a teenager she struggles with self esteem, we have a world that constantly pushes our kids to meet an unreachable ideal. Someone elses idea of beauty or intelligence, a standard that no one can ever meet. Yet God made her just the way she is, thick curly hair, big blue eyes, a tender heart and a loving personality. God gifted her with a beautiful singing voice, and a general artist temperment. An intellegent mind but disorganized. Far more than this He has gifted her with a sensitivity to His voice and to others. When she was a young child she would often be moved to tears by worship music, or simply by the thought of Christ on the cross. I remember coming home from an Easter service and Jessica's eyes were just sparkling. She got several sheets of paper and began to write and draw things like "He is risen!!!" "He is alive" pictures of an empty tumb and put them up on the walls. She was so filled with praise and joy it just had to come out. She has such a loving heart, she absolutely refuses to put people into catagories and judge them. She doesn't see "the poor", "the disabled" or whatever else.. she sees people, like her friend t-bone who has CP. He calls her tickle and they are friends. That's all there is to it. But she doesn't see how special she is, she only see's the girl who isn't the size 3, the class validictorian, or whatever. I have often asked her why she can't extend the same love and compassion to herself that she gives to others. So I would ask God to show her how He sees her, fearfully and wonderfully made for His good works.

My prayer for my twins would be different. You see in some ways their special needs have kept them from the comparison game. They are blissfully unaware of the fashion trends and impossible standards of the world. But their special needs and their issue with talking to people outside of the family prevents people from knowing these two beautiful, sweet girls. The outside world doesn't hear the silly knock-knock jokes, that in reality aren't very funny. They don't hear the genuinely sweet way they talk about others, or their silly made up games. They don't hear how the girls try to understand why someone as good and holy as Jesus had to die on a cross. Why would people kill someone who was good? You see when the girls don't talk people assume they can't, or they don't understand, or they just don't try to communicate any more. Rare is the person who knows how to just be with my girls. So I pray that someday, God will allow others to see my special angels the way He does, fearfully and wonderfully made for His good purposes. Not defective or needy, but made in the image of Christ.

So there is the deepest prayer of this mothers heart. Thank you for listening.