Prayer Prompt #16: When You Don't Understand Your Child

For you created my inmost being:
     you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made:
     your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
     when I was made in the secret place,
     when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body;
     all the days ordained for me were written in your book
     before one of them came to be.
Psalm 139:13-16

Along with the explosion of love and lack of sleep that accompanies a new baby, does anyone else remember the utter confusion?? Clean diaper? Check. Fed? Check. Well rested? Check. Cuddled? Check. Played with? Check. Comfortably dressed? Check. Okay -- so why in the world is this tiny person still crying . . . 

I was so befuddled by my first newborn! But it helped me see God as Maker and I began to see that, even though I didn't always understand my child's behavior, that God did because He designed him. All the quirks, habits, dreams, fears, and thought patterns that I'd spend his whole life trying to figure out were already known and understood completely by his Maker. 

So those unexplained newborn cries? And, as he grows, those thoughts and behaviors that seem to pop up out of nowhere? I learned to go to God with a prayer like this:

Dear LORD, You created the inmost being of this child.  You have knit him together and in a wonderful way - there is nothing about him that is hidden from You.  Right now I don't understand what's happening with my child, but You do so I need You to tell me what I should do in this situation. Thank You for being my interpreter and adviser and enabling me to raise this child in a way that honors You and who You have programmed him to be. In Jesus' name, amen.