Jessie’s story

I am participating in Anna’s Circle Training and during the session on Listening Prayer, Sandra asked if we had any examples of times that we heard God in our prayers. I shared about a recent time I prayed for a conversation with my almost 14-year-old son. I am a mother of four children and he is my oldest.

We are at a stage where too many of our conversations end up badly. I see him watching things that I know are not good for him to see, and when I try to explain why, he most often walks away, goes to his room and closes the door. I want to have good talks with him and understand what he is thinking and how he is feeling, but this pattern seems to repeat continuously.

One day, I saw that he was watching something on YouTube that I did not feel was healthy for him or age-appropriate. When I questioned what he was seeing, the conversation headed down the same path with him commenting, “You don’t understand me” and “I don’t know what is wrong with me watching this,” etc. This time, I immediately prayed to God for wisdom and for Him to give me the right words to connect with my son. I told him, “Let’s not do this again.” I asked him not to walk away this time so that we could talk. I told him I wanted to know what was happening in his life, and we started to talk.

My son told me about the kids in this class, what they watch, and how they find it funny. After my prayer, this conversation took a much different path and ended better than I hoped. He shared what happens with his friends and what they do together. We ended up watching a show together and truly connecting. God answered my prayer and gave me the words my son needed to hear from me, and I’m very grateful that our relationship has been much better ever since.