PARENTING - A BEAUTIFUL CALL | KAIROS GLOBAL | MAY 2019

Author: Joggy Dinoy

Intro: Joggy Dinoy shares the wisdom that she has learned from life, through her experiences as a parent striving through God’s grace to live the vocation of parenthood to the fullest.

Parenting is one of the most beautiful yet challenging jobs that God has entrusted to us as human beings. Through the Bible, we learn and understand that children are a blessing and a gift to parents, yet there are times when we are left confused and worried that we aren't doing it right. How well are we handling this gift is an important question, which we need to ask ourselves at frequent intervals. Are we hitting the right buttons?

Soon after our marriage was fixed, my husband Dinoy got a job in Kuwait and we moved to Kuwait within a month of our marriage. Starting a new life in this new place was exciting, and with the presence of Jesus Youth, we quickly connected and eased into the fellowship here. I started to look for job opportunities, and within a few months I received a job offer. It was at the same time that we also became aware that God has blessed us with a child in womb. When we looked at it from a worldly perspective, this gift came at a cost. The job offer was rescinded because of the pregnancy and my desire to build a career was crushed. Nevertheless, God gave me the courage to accept the situation and to understand His plan and in the month of June 2008, I delivered Samantha, who brought so much joy into our little world.

Our small family was a happy family; and our desire to have a second child was also blessed by God. The news of our second child came on a day, along with many other small bundles of happiness. It was on the same day, that Dinoy won a bumper prize in form of a car in a raffle draw at his office. I delivered Issaiah in October 2012. Our small and happy family now growing was full of happy moments. The joy, love and happiness, both the children brought into our lives was amazing. But things were not to be the same.

Boys being boys, the real task of managing arose as our second child started growing up, and our little world was getting messy. He was becoming naughty day by day, many a time disobedient and throwing lot of tantrums. Not only was he busy, but made sure even we were ticking him along with his hyper activeness. He liked going out, however confining him to a closed space was a challenge and with his full on energy, he kept us fully busy by running around and creating noise, be it at any friends’ place, Church or JY gathering. We noticed that when we would go for a prayer meeting or household, the entire group was silent and all the other children were obediently participating in prayer. But as our little one entered the room, he would become the center of attraction. Everyone would then get distracted and all the children who were silent till then, would start imitating him in his actions and get distracted. We sometimes felt very embarrassed.

That is when I started understanding that it is not an easy job to be a parent and, when it got bad, we would start yelling, shouting and sometimes spanking also. I was losing all my control, but nothing was changing. A point came when I was completely depressed about the situation. During my personal prayer, I cried out to God, and I started feeling guilty that I wasn’t able to be a good mother or raise him in a good way.

That was when the lord answered me with this word of God. “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:6-7). I started realising my mistakes, recognizing that since my daughter was very calm, I didn’t face any problems with her, and I was expecting it to be the same with my son.  But I forgot that every child is created differently and that it would be better for me to try and understand his unique needs, seeing how best to meet them.

Be thankful for them as individuals

 Some children can be very open, spontaneous and good communicators. Others may be more self-conscious and stubborn. We started praying for our son by laying our hands on him every morning and night. We started giving thanks and praise for blessing us to be parents and gifting us with our children. Our worries and disappointments were slowly turning into our happiness. I was once again able to enjoy my parenthood and was able to accept the daily challenges of being a parent, in spite of the daily hectic schedules and life became meaningful once again.

Never let your anger drive your discipline — all disciplinary measures should be done in love:

 I started understanding that to change our son, we need to first change ourselves. Dinoy and I decided to be more loving towards him, and for the small mistakes he did, not to shout at him but gently make him realise his mistakes.  Though it was a tough job at first to control our anger, we could slowly see the difference in him and he started to be more attentive to whatever we had to say.

Know your sheep – “Be diligent to know the state of your flocks, and attend to your herds”

(Prov 27:23): Caring for our children in a good way so that we don’t end up in situations which will damage them for life is extremely important. I started setting up certain limits for him, for play time and watching cartoons. It is good for children to have boundaries for a sound development. Children will recognize that boundaries are an expression of love and care. One time we went to a supermarket and he took some candies from an open jar, which we didn’t see at the time. Once we were outside the store, I saw them in his hand and I explained to him that he had taken without paying for it and it was not correct. As soon as he realized his mistake, he happily went and kept it back. I was very happy to see the change in him. 

We gave him small punishments for his mistakes - like no chocolate or not taking him out, and we found this to be very effective. But there were times when we had to be very strict also. As it says in Hebrews 12:11, "When we are punished, it seems to us at the time something to make us sad, not glad. Later, however, those who have been disciplined by such punishment reap the peaceful reward of a righteous life”. Every day was a challenge for us and God was giving us the grace to carry out our responsibilities as a parent.

Be flexible in your relationship with them: When our children start growing older and they are about to become teenagers, it is important for us as parents to step back a little from being their educators and rather be guides and good conversation partners for them. My daughter and I share a friendly relationship, which allows her to share a lot with me and I also try to be good listener. It is also a good idea to celebrate special events in their lives, celebrating small victories and supporting them in their defeats without meddling. This can really help them to have strong confidence in us as parents who support them in all life situations.

I keep my complete faith in God for the responsibility given to me and trust in His complete providence. There was a point early on when I was so depressed and thought I couldn’t handle any more children, but the Lord blessed me and changed my way of thinking, and I was open to life again. In Nov 2017, God blessed us with our third child, Jairus. By the flow of things we understand that he is going to follow in the footsteps of his brother and going to keep us busy as well, but we are better prepared now.

Managing three children who are at three different stages of life, while meeting their emotional and psychological needs is challenging, and only by God’s grace are we able to do this. The JY fellowship also helps me a lot, to face these struggles with patience and encourage me in all the difficult situations of life.

Parenting is an ongoing process, and at every stage of a person’s life parenting pays a vital role, not only when they are small, but even when they grow up. This is why in every stage of our children’s life we need to be praying as a parent. Understanding them, accepting them the way they are and guiding them at each step of their life, while at the same time leading them to love God above all else – that should be the most important part. Always reinforcing that our greatest life goal is to glorify God in all we do.

Children are a real blessing in our life, they make us realize our shortcomings, the areas of our own lives that need improvement and a resetting of our priorities. At times we may be more focused on living our passion, work, friends and so on.  But it is equally important to spend some quality time with our kids. There are particular times in our daily schedule that we set aside as family time. This is the time for our kids to do something actively along with our involvement, maybe singing, storytelling, enacting something, or discussing something in common. This kind of time set aside is something which our kids enjoy, and it’s a time of binding the entire family together. 

Joggy Dinoy hailing from Nagpur, is working and living in Kuwait with her husband Dinoy David and 3 kids, Samantha,Issaiah and Jairus. She is part of the Kuwait JY National Council.