When you find a piece of bubble gum in the glove compartment just for you – smile.
The year was 1986, and my father had just finished preaching at a church in Ohio. I was a little over two years old. My mother was holding me and turned to tell my father something when her heel caught on the first step of an old wooden staircase. My father watched helplessly as my mother and I toppled head over heels down the steep staircase. Holding my younger sister in his arms and the diaper bag, my dad was incapable of doing anything to stop the disaster before him. Angels must have carried us through the fall because not a bone was broken on either of us.
Immediately following the fall down the staircase, I began to stutter while speaking. I can only imagine what my mother must have been thinking. A mother wants only to protect her children, and here I was, stuttering because of an accidental fall.
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At five years old, I started kindergarten at Sunshine Christian School. I can still remember the small church where I attended. The Sunday school rooms served as our classrooms. One room served as our lesson room, while another was where we had story time. I can remember sitting on “magic carpets” the teacher said we could go anywhere we imagined. I was so amazed, thinking we were about to take off in the sky. I was slightly disappointed when I realized my carpet would not lift off the floor. Off the corner of the sanctuary was a smaller room with a TV that sat on a rolling stand. I remember watching Mr. Rodgers on a VHS tape during the day. And, of course, outside play time was always a must.
Play gives children a chance to practice what they are learning.
Mr. Rodgers
The church filled up on Graduation Day. We all had our cap and gowns on and received our diplomas for graduating kindergarten. I was a lot like Charlotte: spicy yet full of love and kindness on the inside. I smiled, walking across the stage, not afraid of the crowd in the slightest.
Before the school year was over, my parents asked my teacher how my stuttering was during the school day. My teacher answered, “What stuttering?” My parents were stunned. I hadn’t said a complete sentence without stuttering since the accident. They explained to the teacher what had happened. She suggested my parents sit down and talk to me about what had happened.
Later that week, my mother scooped me up and sat me on the couch. She told me about the fall down the stairs, but the accident was over, and I did not have to be afraid she wouldn’t fall with me anymore.
Almost immediately, my stuttering stopped. I had been relating a fear of falling to my mother and compensating by stuttering. Neither was the truth, the fear of my mother, or the stuttering. It took the problem being revealed to fix it.
When Eva was a toddler, she, too, started stuttering. Unsure as to why, I began to pray. We told her to slowly think about her words as she spoke. We continued to pray, and little by little, the stuttering stopped.
Sitting around the breakfast table, Charlotte voiced what she had repeated to me for weeks. I sat listening to her three-year-old voice: This is my Bible, every word of it is true. I am what it says I am. I can do what it says I can do. I am bold, I am beautifully and wonderfully made by God. I am the head and not the tail. I am above only and never beneath. I am a blessing everywhere I go, and I leave people better than I find them.
When we teach our children who they are in Christ, when the storm comes, they recognize the One who walks on the water.
When I dropped Eva off at school one day, she said, “I love our playground, but it really needs a slide. The Third graders don’t get to slide.” I sat there pondering and was about to change the subject when I heard the Lord speak, “Listen to her.” It was a prime opportunity, and I was about to miss it. I gathered my thoughts around what she was saying and then suggested we begin to pray about it. I explained that we miss out on many blessings simply because we do not ask God for them.
Every day, as we pulled through the car-rider line, we would thank God for a slide on the playground! It wasn’t long before an opportunity presented itself for me to ask about a possible slide. A slide was purchased through a series of right connections and like-minded moms who saw the value in offering the kids fun as they enjoyed the outside.
It may seem minor to us as grown-ups; we seek money, fame, and fortune. But to a child, a slide will do just fine.
Make your requests known before Him. He will answer clearly.
…and the tongue of that stammers will be ready to speak plainly. Isaiah 32:4
