God is Powerful Let Go

Last evening I attended Celebrate Recovery at a local Baptist Church. I started attending because of my son, age 19, who found this program when he was struggling as a result of his poor choices last year. It has helped me to view my son as a prodigal. He has been given everything and has had every opportunity. To date, he has not been able to stay a course free of bad and immature decisions. My heartbreak over this child that I love and hope for has hurt me in so many ways.

Over the past few years, I have come to feel so much despair. I have sought comfort from my husband, my friends and through reading seeking to find answers to what can I do to help this child. Although I am grateful to those who have supported me, I have continued to feel like a small boat tossed about by a storm and have suffered more and more with each crisis that has come.

Although a person of faith, I have felt limited consolation during this time and been unable to trust and surrender my child to God and to find personal peace during all the turmoil. Celebrate Recovery is a 12 step program starting as all 12 step programs with the initial step of acknowledging that one's present situation is unmanageable. Check that box. My son is a teen and despite mine and his father's counsel he continues to make poor decisions each one putting him at risk and costing us money and even more significant causing the rest of the family to suffer. I am powerless over these decisions he is making as they are his own. . Step 2 as a person who claims to have faith, I need myself to truly believe that a power greater than me can restore sanity in my life. Ok I can’t think of and no one can tell me anything to change this situation. I believe in God and knowing his qualifications should convince me that he has power that I do not.

Next step, knowing that I am powerless over my son; it is time for me to decide to turn my own life and will over to the care of God. So this is where I find myself. I have over the past few weeks started each day with Catholic readings and reflections and am working as this blog says to grow. So today realizing that God has through the ages demonstrated that his power is beyond our human capabilities I take comfort in knowing that God who can heal lepers, make nations victorious and even has power over death is in charge. Wow, what a relief! Today’s passage that I read that speaks to me is, "Great is our Lord vast in Power, with wisdom beyond measure." Psalms 147:5 So God is what will get me through this situation. If I seek his wisdom I can be empowered by him revealing to me how to live each day and how to face any other crisis that may come my way even those which are beyond my control.

Slowly, I am experiencing a return to hope. Each day one at a time I am seeing some changes in my son that are better. He is trying to give up smoking, he is more responsible and he is beginning college locally. These seem to be happening without my nagging and worrying. I don't know whether he is seeking counsel from God even though he follows my wishes and attends church and Celebrate Recovery but I am working to trust that God is working in his life somehow and trying to free myself from this worry by trying to grow in my own faith and understanding.