Lost Opportunity

Yesterday I was flipping channels on tv and I ran across Charles Stanley.  He is a minister (I think Baptist) that my parents loved.  You see I started out as a southern Baptist and finally found my home in the Catholic church.  Anyhow, I paused and listened.  He was talking about the scripture that Paul spoke which is widely repeated, "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength."  I love that verse. 

I have been studying humility, as opposed to pride.  But, on the other side of humility or perhaps a part of humility that we rarely consider is confidence.  He was saying that we have confidence when we are  using the gifts that God has given us and know that we can do what he asks because we know that he is THE one who fortifies us and gives us the means to accomplish his will.  Pride is when we think we can do it because WE have the power to do it ourselves. 

Then, I turned on Oprah's Master Class.  She began talking about her mother and grandmother who were both maids.  She remembered her grandmother hanging out the sheets for the woman she worked for and turning around and saying, "Oprah Gayle, you'd better watch so that you can do this yourself one day."  She remembers thinking ...no I won't.  She said that she felt it was not because at 6 yrs old she felt above it but because "a voice" she felt in her soul made her aware that she would do something else.  She went on to discuss all of these different times when others would tell her why she couldn't do something and it never seemed to worry her because she always KNEW that God was there with her, speaking to her and as long as she listened to His "whisper" that it could be done...and done beyond her wildest dreams.  Now that is confidence. 

Another thing Charles Stanley said was that he told his kids every night that if they could dream it and it was God's will, they could do it.  This instantly made me sad.  I have missed so many opportunities to build up my children, especially my son.  He does not want to hear what I have to say right now.  Not about him or his future, or drugs or rehab or church....But, I want to say, I want him to know that with every cell that makes up this middle aged body of mine, I KNOW, as I don't think he does, just how smart he is, how much talent he has.  Regardless of the obstacles that drugs and alcohol and the effects of their use have placed before him, he can do all things through Christ who gives him strength.  I know this.  It weighs so heavy on my heart that I did not help him to see it so long ago.  My soul weeps.

So today I pray for my son to learn, even though I can't tell him or make him believe me; that he will hear God's whisper.....that he will believe God's whisper....that he can do amazing things with God's help...and if he is doing God's will he will experience more joy than any substance can ever give him.  I pray for forgiveness for failing my son in so many ways and I pray for Henry.