Parenting

Each day while my son was in kindergarten I walked with him to the bus stop.   On one of those days when the bus pulled up, a big delivery truck was coming in the opposite direction. I’m still not sure if the bus driver was waving the truck to go ahead and pass or if he just failed to see the truck coming. His wave had always been a signal for the children that it was safe to cross the street, but that day it wasn’t safe.

Joshua began to run for the highway. I was right behind him and pulled him back as the truck passed. My heart was racing and I couldn’t believe what had almost happened. Joshua didn’t even realize that he’d been in any danger and after a moment slipped from my arms and crossed the street to the waiting bus. I was so grateful that I was there that day, that I hadn’t sent him alone to the corner to meet the bus.

These days Joshua is a big 6 foot 4 and I don’t worry about sending him to the bus on his own. But I still worry and the worry is bigger. After all, “youth today are being raised in enemy territory with a declining standard of morality.[i]” These dangers are different from the ones I protected him from as a little boy, ones that were usually in the realm of my control. I could put things up high, lock up cupboards, put up fences, strap on life jackets and be there pretty much every minute.

Now the things that threaten him aren’t things I can put barriers around. I can’t be with him all the time. The choices he innocently made as a little child pale in comparison to the life-altering choices he has the potential of making today. When I see him struggle against “powers, principalities and dominions” there is very little I can do. I can love, I can support, I can advise, but I can’t just pull him back to safety like I did at the bus stop that day.

Active Faith

I’m not the first mother to raise my children in enemy territory. Thousands of years ago a group of mothers raised boys who were protected while others fell around them. Helaman tells us that their preservation was astonishing to their whole army. And they could only ascribe this miracle to the “faith in which they had been taught to believe,[ii]” a faith that kept them safe in the midst of their enemy. These mothers had taught their sons that if they didn’t doubt God would deliver them. When those sons rehearsed the words of their mothers they said, “We do not doubt our mothers knew it.[iii]“

When the 2000 stripling warriors said this they were expressing not only a faith in what they had been taught, but a faith in their mothers. They knew that their mothers knew the truth of the things they had taught. This is good news for me. I can teach, guide and direct my children, but I don’t have any power over the faith they develop. I do have power over the faith I develop. I can strengthen my faith. I can remove distractions from my life. I can listen more closely to the promptings of the spirit and heed them more quickly. I can keep my covenants. I can serve with love. I can live so that my children will have no doubt, no matter what they choose to believe, that I believe the things I have taught them.

I believe in the power of a mother’s faith to protect her child. I believe in the words of President Packer.   “Faith is a real power, not just an expression of belief. There are few things more powerful than the faithful prayers of a righteous mother.[iv]” My faith, my prayers have power. It’s a power I intend to wield again and again in the protection of my children. Better than the locks and life jackets of childhood is the assurance that “the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance.[v]”

Submissive Faith

Yet, even as I express my belief in the power of a mother’s faith I see how I have once again tried to take things into my own hands. You see, I have found yet another way to be in control of the outcome of my children’s lives. “I can still protect them,” I say to myself. It’s a tricky balance to believe, really believe that there is protection and healing for the ones I love and yet release control of what that looks like.

Even for the stripling warriors, things didn’t turn out perfectly. We know that although all of them survived; every single one of them was wounded. Perhaps some of them were wounded to the point that they wished for death. No matter the strength of our faith we, nor the ones we care for, get to go through life unscathed. So what does this mean for a mother who wants the best for her children, a mother who longs for their protection and safety?

She can’t choose fear. That isn’t the way to live. She has to choose faith, but the focus of that faith has to be in Christ. Any other faith will leave her empty when deliverance doesn’t come the way she expected. Faith in Christ means having the kind of faith he did. Faith to accept his Father’s will regardless of what it cost him. So the question isn’t: Can I have the kind of faith that protects my child from harm? I can have that faith. The real question is: Can I have the faith to lose what I love, if necessary? It’s the kind of faith that Elder David A. Bednar recently spoke of, “Strong faith in the Savior is submissively accepting of His will, even if the outcome is not what we hoped for or wanted.[vi]“

A mother of faith needs both kinds of faith. She needs to pray, hope and work at her faith believing that her efforts will protect her children. She also needs the faith to say, “Be it unto me (and mine) according to thy word.” It is really the only way. Our greatest peace and safety is found in trusting in “the tender mercies of the Lord” and in His “power of deliverance” whatever it may be.