Mentoring Moms

Our 3rd meeting of the year...

I’m a mom with a 19 year old and a 17 year old. One has been in college for 2 years and I am about to graduate my “baby”. I have been homeschooling for 14 years so I am graduating tooJ. I am truly blessed because my girls are really good in spite of all my mistakes as a parent. Praise God for he is good.

I used the illustration of ironing to help me communicate how our children are like garments that we must know before we iron them. We must know what fabric they are made of, the structure they are to hold and what temperature they can withstand.  Are these wrinkles or are they pleats. The first I will want to get out, but the later I will want to iron very carefully so as not to ruin the garment. Do I use a cool iron? Medium heat? Can I use steam? This  is where temperaments come in. We are born with different temperaments/personalities. Gary Smally and John Trent developed a fun way to classify them: the Lion (dominance), Otter(influence), Golden Retriever(steadiness), and Beaver(compliance). Each personality has strength’s and weaknesses. Our job as mother’s is to understand our children’s personalities with their strength’s and weaknesses and train them by praying God’s word which is our iron and the holy spirit is the steam. Proverb’s 22:6 tells us to “train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he won’t depart” so it is important to know their strengths and weaknesses so we can TRAIN them/Direct them. As we train them they become more balanced. As an example, a Lion’s strength’s are strong willed and independent with weaknesses of seeming domineering and unemotional. As a mother of a Lion we would want to pray this  way.  May_________________ obey his/her parents in the Lord, for this is right. Ephesians 6:1.  They are wired to be in charge, but a 5 yr old is just not ready for the job yet, so we must help them.  They need to learn that the ultimate one we are to be obedient to is Our Lord Jesus. May_________ show his/her love for Christ by obeying His commands. John 14:15.  We can pray Job 22:21 to petition for submission to authority. For the weaknesses we can pray for a servant’s heart by praying 2 Timothy 2:24-25- As the Lord’s servant, may ___________ not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. I LOVE this! That is sooo how we want out Lion to turn out to be. By knowing your child’s strengths and weaknesses you can pray purposefully and passionately for their heart’s  by using God’s word effectively. It says in James 5:16B The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. Let’s use the iron the Lord has given us-His word. Even before they become readers we can direct them to the word when we are disciplining them.

There was a point I had wanted to share in this area that I forgot so if you don’t mind I will share now. When Rebekka (my oldest) was young (@ 7 or 8), she was still very strong willed and she didn’t want to obey. At children’s church they were doing a series about obeying your parents, but not just obeying,  obeying ALL the way they called it. This was something the Lord brought at the right time. What an answer to prayer. Because it was not just coming from her parents, (it was coming from the Children’s pastor) we began to see a change in her. She began to obey a little more, however her attitude was still not obeying. Her body was obedient but her heart was not.  If I asked her to pick up her toys and put them away, she would pick them up roughly and storm out the room, gritting her teeth saying ”fine, I’ll put them away”. So the Lord gave us  the phrase “ are you obeying or obeying all the way?” to help train her and God worked on her heart.  Our prayer was that she would obey ALL the way.  And we are blessed that the Lord worked in her this way to give us a very respectful, obedient daughter.

We must also know our children’s Love language before we can truly understand how God made them to receive love. The five love languages are:

1.       Word’s of affirmation

Lots of I love you’s are important and the reason why is icing on the cake

2.       Quality Time

Undivided attention-Being therewith no distractions/chores, TV, etc.

3.       Acts of service

Doing things for them like fixing a broken toy is the bomb.

4.       Receiving gifts

Loves gifts-a piece of candy is the crown jewels to this child.

5.       Physical touch

Hugs and kisses mean the world to these children.

We all need all of these, but there are usually one or two that really speak to us. If we speak their love language they will be responsive. If we don’t we can really hurt their feelings. I shared how one time I LOST it and yelled at them then I realized it really hurt their feelings (their eyes were as big as saucers). I apologized and put myself in timeout. Soon they were sitting beside me with their arms around me forgiving me. If I had not done the right thing I could have caused terrible harm. I also shared how my Katherine is a Quality Time kid and was always pulling on my leg for attention. The Lord impressed upon me how I could train her and her sister a better way to get my attention since I was obviously not aware of when they needed it. I sat them down and told them that I wasn’t very good at realizing they needed attention so whenever they wanted my undivided attention all they had to do was put their hand on my leg or shoulder and that would be MY que that they needed attention. Once I gave them eye contact they could tell me ”mommy I need attention” and I would actually stop whatever I was doing and go sit on the sofa and cuddle. We roll played this many times with me being me and then them being me. We pretended to wash dishes, talk on the phone, be in a conversation with a friend, all events that naturally happen so they could understand the application. And it worked and it still works today only I can’t put them in my lap anymoreJ  

I hope I have been able to give you tools that help you know your garments(children) by understanding their temperaments/personality types and how they receive love. Also how you can use God’s word effectively to pray purposefully and passionately for their strengths as well as their weaknesses so your garments can come out crisp, ready to be enjoyed. I want to thank you for your graciousness  and I pray God’s blessings on you all as you do YOUR ironing.

Blessings,

Alicia Ramirez