11 Oct Pray The Bad Habits Away

Sean has some bad habits from time to time and some of them are really persistent, lasting almost a year and more.

Sometimes we get really upset and frustrated at his bad habits (e.g. finger sucking)

Wasn’t really angry to start but I got increasingly impatient and became very upset at Sean for his really persistent bad habit. Not sure how to resolve. Scolding and punishing doesn’t really work. Many of these solutions are fear based. And to keep nagging or to affirm and encourage positive behaviours didnt really work for us so far.

This morning during worship, God provided a solution. Remove all the punishments and fear based threats, and wife and I shall use prayer as the weapon over his bad habits.

Later on, we need to keep reminding ourselves to use prayer as a weapon and to pray over his bad habits. This is actually easier said than done. Most naturally we will go into our own habit of discipline and our own impatience and frustrations will jump out at the first instance in parenting. To deliberately focus back to God and to remember to pray things aways is not natural and we have a long way to learn in parenting this way!