I heard a woman on TikTok say, “No one can break your heart like your own children,” and I agree with her 100%.

There are days when our children make us so happy and proud to be their parents. We celebrate them and even brag to others about our children. We gleam with joy and pride about their accomplishments and how smart and intelligent they are. As a mom, it fills my heart with happiness when they do well, and I want to tell everyone about it. 

But what about the times when they are disobedient and disrespectful? We don’t like to broadcast that. We are hurt, angry, and ashamed when dealing with a rude or defiant child. God bless you if you have a child that has never been disobedient or disrespectful.

For me, that is not the case. I recently had a significant falling out with my son, and he was mean, cruel, abrasive, and downright disrespectful. Amid my anger, I told him that he had to leave. I didn’t care that he had nowhere to go; I just wanted him out of the house. I was so angry that I was in tears! My anger was so hot that I wanted the wrath of God to come upon him at that very moment. That may sound like a bit much, but I was that angry. I didn’t speak to him for days and was adamant that I would do nothing else for this child who was once my joy. 

I prayed and cried to the Lord about this, and when he finally answered me, this is what I understood.

The Lord told me I am a single woman trying to lead a man. My son is still young, but he is over 18. Things go wrong as a single parent when the mom attempts to lead (sons) because it is out of God’s order. The spirit of the Lord told me to take my hands off. Regardless of how I got here, I could no longer lead once my son became a man in God’s eyes. It is time to turn him over to God and allow Him to take the lead. 

That’s where God started, but He had much more to say to me. 

As children of God, we disrespect Him, blaspheme His name, rebel, and turn our backs on Him. We are ungrateful and selfish; we know it all and don’t want or need God’s help when things are going well for us. Not to mention, we treat God as if he is stupid and doesn’t see or know ALL. We tell ourselves that God doesn’t know what he is doing; he’s old and senile because he keeps getting our genders wrong. He should step aside because he is old-fashioned and doesn’t know times have changed. It is 2023. This behavior and ways of thinking are just a few examples of how we disrespect God!

We live how we want until we hit a brick wall and can no longer see it in front of us or until we are angry and scared and cannot find our way out of the pit we dug for ourselves. We are like house pets, clean and manicured, but instead of being grateful and content with what we have and who we belong to, we run off as soon as we get an itch for what or who is over there.

Life starts giving us lefts, rights, and uppercuts and hitting us with the consequences of sin, and like the house pet that ran off, we come running back. Now, we are no longer clean and manicured, but the owner is so happy and relieved that the pet returned and welcomed them with open arms only to find all the fleas and ticks, but the owner is willing to clean the pet up.

They clean up the pet, take it to the vet to ensure everything is okay, and pay for shots, flea and tick treatments, grooming, and whatever is needed to get that pet back to its state before running off. Everything is great for a while, and then the pet runs off again, but this time, it comes back in worse condition than before, and each time, the owner is willing to clean that pet back up and restore it to its clean and manicured state.

How long will the owner put up with this? There will come a time when the pet comes back, the door will be closed, or the house empty, and no one there will receive the pet back.

This is what we do to our creator, our God. How many times do we need to run off before we finally get that God is our refuge, our safe place, the one who cleans us up, feeds us, keeps us safe, and is willing to care for our every need?

Now think about this: The same way we disrespect God, our children disrespect us. We get so angry and mad that we may even put our children out of the house depending on the severity; we give them the silent treatment, walk around mad, naming all the things we do for them but never once think about how our father, God in heaven feels when we disrespect Him.

God created us; he knows the number of hairs on our heads. He has given us life and loves us, but if we keep running off, one day, we will find that it is too late to return. Time will be up! And you will have made your bed in a place separated from God for eternity. It is time to REPENT! Turn away from your sins and seek Him while He may still be found.

If you are reading this, please understand that you are here for a reason. Each day you wake up is another chance to do better and be better than you were yesterday. 

May God bless and keep you!