Ch.7. (The Power of a Parent’s Blessing)

Blessing Your Child In Infancy And Early Childhood

 

 Another key time at which blessing or cursing can occur is during infancy and early childhood. A child is very vulnerable at this stage because he cannot meet any of his own needs. If he doesn’t feel secure that his needs will be met, the child may begin to trust no one but himself. Of course, this is not a moment in time but a season of life during which the child is lookiing for consistent nurture and care. It is this consistency that allows a child to learn to trust others.

 

Key Role Player

 

 The key role player in blessing a child in infancy and early childhood is the mother. While the affection of the father is important, it is really the mother’s care that is critical to establishing basic trust during this key time of life. She is the one who can answer the key question in the child’s heart with the divine truth that will bring peace to her child’s soul.

 

Key Question To Be Answered

 

 In early childhood the key questions to be answered are: Is there anyone I can really trust to meet my needs? Is there anyone here bigger, stronger, and wiser than I am, who truly loves and cares about me?

An infant must trust people outside himself to survive. As a result, the enemy wants to make sure the child receives no consistent care, thus creating a significant fear of death, inner turmoil, and a struggle to survive. The enemy wants the child to think, “If there is nobody I can count on to meet my needs, then I’ll have to meet all my own needs.” If this is not possible for the infant or toddler to accomplish, and it likely will not be, he will experience much fear, and his soul will not be at rest.

 

Blessing and Cursing In Infancy and Early Childhood

 

 Of course it was God’s plan for children to receive a powerful message of blessing through their parents in infancy and throughout early childhood. Below are some of the ways parents can either bless or curse their children in this phase of development.

 

Blessing at the time of infancy may include:

 

1. The parents communicating verbally and physically that the child is wanted, accepted, received, and welcome, with 

    the mother in particular loving, holding, and physically nurturing the baby.

 

2. The mother breast-feeding the infant to help create a physical and emotional bond.

 

3. The mother giving consistent care and meeting the child’s physical and emotional needs, thus encouraging him to trust

    someone outside himself to meet the needs.

 

4. The father expressing significant amounts of physical touch and affection

 

Cursing at the time of infancy may include:

 

1. The parents communicating verbally and physically that the child is not wanted and not welcome, and the mother 

    withholding love, affection, or physical nurture.

 

2. The mother not creating a physical or emotional bond through breast-feeding or other forms of meaningful touch and

    nurturing.

 

3. The child receiving inconsistent care because Mom is not steadily available to meet his physical and emotional needs

    and therefore outsources this responsibility to an array of caregivers (relatives, day-care workers, nannies, etc.)

 

4. The father not showing appropriate physical touch and affection.

 

 

Potential Consequences of Blessing and Cursing in Early Childhood

 

Children need lots of physical touch and affection from their parents. Cuddling and other forms of physical touch create healthy bonding and impart a sense of security, which is part of the blessing God intended. Research scientist James Prescott, phD, who has studied the effects of early childhood sensory deprivation, says, “If you don’t bond with anyone as a child, you’re not going to bond with anyone as an adult.” 1 footnote

1 Kim Knight, “The Consequences of Sensory Deprivation in Early Childhood,” The Art of Health, July 14, 2010,

http://kimknight 101. wordpress.com/2010/07/14/the-conse-

quences-of-sensory-deprivation-in-early-childhood/(accessed Dec.1o, 2012).

 

 Women’s bodies have the natural capacity to nourish their babies. This is part of God’s design to bless children. Breast-feeding ensures an infant receives lots of physical touch and nurturing. The baby naturally bonds with his mother as he is held and cuddled several times per day. In ancient Hebrew culture (and in most past culture) it was typical for a mother to breast-feed her children. In our modern Western culture many people prefer to bottle-feed their babies. One common reason is that many mothers works outside the home and are not available to breast-feed several times a day.

Through my years of ministry I have found that many people who did not receive blessing through a mother’s touch during infancy develop a deep inner craving for physical touch and tactile stimulation later in life. This need for physical touch and affection is sometimes sexualized. I have encountered many men who look to satisfy this inner need for touch through physical intimacy with their wives. However, this is not what marital intimacy was created to do.

 

 Many times when I’ve counseled couples, the wives have told me privately that they feel overwhelmed by their husbands’ needs. “Pastor,” they say, “I enjoy sexual intimacy as much as anyone, but my husband’s need is excessive. I am becoming exhausted.” As I have prayed with the husbands to discover the root issue, the Lord has exposed that there is a deep need for nurture in the heart of a little boy who was never cuddled as an infant.

 

 Young children who have not experienced physical love and cuddling from their parents will frequently develop doubt that their needs will be met. When this happens, the enemy often attempts to impart a fear of death in the infant, who has no ability to care for himself. If there is not consistent cuddling and nurturing from Mom, the child may from an early age begin to trust in himself to meet his own needs, fearing he will die otherwise. The child does not usually do this consciously. He simply begins to conclude, “No one is here to meet my needs, so I had better take care of myself. Since no one is here for me, I won’t trust anyone outside myself to provide for me.”

 

 When this fear and insecurity are established deep inside a child, they do not lessen as he grows and enters adulthood. They simply produce a teenager or adult with an inability to trust his friends, spouse, or even God. As an adult, this person may give his life to Christ and say, “Lord, I trust you with my whole life.” Yet when crisis awakens the deep fear inside, this person will immediately take his life out of God’s hands and act on his own behalf.

we have prayed for several people who have had a deep inability to trust a spouse or God. When we asked the Holy Spirit when this insecurity started, we quickly learn that it started in infancy due to a lack of nurturing. The first time I encountered this in a married man, I wasn’t sure how to help him. So we prayed and asked God how to meet his deep need for nutrute since he could not now receive it from his mother. The Lord instructed me to tell this man that God was the only one who could meet his need.

 

 In this particular case the Holy Spirit reminded the husband that one of God’s Hebrew names is El Shaddai. The traditional meaning of the name is “the one who is more than enough to meet any need.” The literal meaning is “the double-breasted one.” Thus El Shaddai, who created man in His own image, male and female, is the double-breasted one who is more than enough to minister to the love deficiency in the heart of any man.

 

 As I shared this with this man and asked him to open his heart to El Shaddai, God began to minister to the depths of his heart and fill him with the love and security that should have been imparted in infancy. After allowing the Holy Spirit to do a deep work in his heart, the man reported that his need for physical intimacy had been quieted, and both he and his wife were now very satisfied with their sexual relationship.

 

 Since I ministered to that couple, I have encountered this situation many times at our Blessing Generations weekend events. I praise God that others have experienced a similar heart resolution when they received from God the impartation of blessing they were supposed to get from their mothers in infancy.

 

 In Hebrew culture it was typical for a mother to be available to cuddle, hold, and meet the needs of her small chlildren. She was neither working outside the home nor involved in twenty five other activities as many mothers today are. A mother’s role was held in high esteem. There was very little chance that a child in that culture would not be cuddled, breast-fed, and nurtured because this was a mother’s top priority, and it is what society expected of her.

In contrast, I believe motherhood has been significantly devalued in our culture today. A stay-at-home mom is sometimes thought to be lazy or unproductive. Even among Christians there is an expectation that a woman should earn money, have a career, or be involved in ministry outside the home. Sadly in our culture there is a significant chance that a child could pass through early childhood without much cuddling and blessing through physical touch.

 

In reality, motherhood is a very high calling in the sight of God. Nurturing and sowing into the lives of her children is one of the most important things a mother will do. I believe it should be the exception, not the norm, for a mother to work outside the home. I realize this would probably not even be possible for single moms and some other families in our current economic situation, but I believe this is God’s ideal.

 

 Another interesting tradition in the ancient Hebrew culture is that children were frequently not weaned until after the first year. In our modern culture this would seem very strange, but I believe God had a purpose in this practice. Because they nursed for so long, babies learned to trust and depend on their mothers. Dependence is a natural phase of healthy emotional and spiritual development. Children who learn to depend on a mom to meet their needs develop a healthy sense of being loved and valued, and later in life they have an ability to trust others to help meet their needs.

 

 On the other hand, children who never learn to depend upon a mother may learn to be independent and self-sufficient from an early age. In our modern culture some parents want their children to become independent as quickly as possible. There are two common reasons for this. One reason is social pressure, so they can keep up with those around them. The second reason is that we are very busy people, and we don’t want to be bogged down taking care of little children. If we can get our toddlers to do things on their own, that frees us to continue our busy lives.

 

 I suspect that we treat our children just the opposite of how God intended and how the ancient Hebrews treated children. We want small children to become independent as qucikly as possible. Then when they become teenagers – the time when God intended for us as parents to release our children to make their own choices as young men and women – we often try to control their choices and make them more dependent.

 

 If children never develop basic trust and security that their needs will be met, then they may instead develop an independent spirit that refuses to receive wise counsel from their parents during their teenage years. This may motivate parents to attempt to control their teenagers’ choices. Weaning children a bit later made it almost impossible for an ancient Hebrew child to not learn dependence and basic trust in early childhood. This made for much more secure teenagers, who were far better spiritually and emotinally prepared to be released into adulthood.

 

Irrational Fear of Abandonment

 

 The Physical presence of a mother who comforts and meets her child’s needs is a powerful form of blessing. Sometimes the enemy uses even the unavoidable absence of a mother to impart his message deep into the heart of a small child. Understanding this, it is important that we be alert to the devil’s schemes and disarm them as soon as we can. More than once I have seen an irrational fear of abandonment sown deep into the heart of a small child simply through the legitimate unavailability of a mother at a traumatic moment in life.

One of the first times I encountered this was when praying for a woman I’ll call Jill. She said she frequently experienced an intense, irrational fear of abandonment and of not being cared for or protected. Jill was married to a wonderful, godly husband. However, her husband frequently traveled for business. Many times when Jill’s husband would be preparing to leave on a business trip, she would beg him not to go. Jill would tell him, “I’m so afraid you won’t come back. The plane might crash, and you could be killed. Or you might be kidnapped.” Trying to comfort her, Jill’s husband would cite statistics on the safety of modern aviation. He would reminded her of how frequently he traveled and that he always returned.

 

 No matter how her husband tried to comfort her, Jill was still terrified every time he left. At times Jill also was fearful that her husband was having an affair and would leave her for someone else. This was extremely hurtful and frustrating for her husband, as he had never even been interested in another woman, nor had he given his wife reason to doubt his commitment to her. Again, no matter how her husband tried, neither reason nor prayer would allay Jill’s fear.

Jill and her husband explained their situation to me during a Blessing Generations Experience. The team and I felt led to simply ask the Lord to show Jill when this fear of abandonment began. After waiting on the Lord for just a few seconds, Jill began to shake with fear and cry uncontrollably. When we asked her what she was experiencing, Jill told us the Holy Spirit had reminded her of a terrifying experience that she endured at five years old.

 

 Jill had been taken to the hospital because she needed surgery to correct a serious heart condition. She remembered having significant apprehension just from the concern her parents expressed about the surgery, but this was not the worst part. Jill’s parents were not allowed to stay with her in the hospital overnight, so when evening came, all they could do was reassure her that everything would be fine that night and then go home.

Soon after her parents left, an intense fear hit Jill’s heart. Here she was five years old with a serious medical condition, not knowing whether she was going to live or die, left in an unfamiliar place. She was terrified all night long and felt abandoned and unloved by her parents. The terror worsened through the night as Jill experienced strange noises, unusual smells, and unfamiliar constantly poking her with needles and putting things in her mouth, nose, and ears.

 

The heart of this five-year-old girl was crying out, “Where’s my dad? Where’s my mom? Don’t they care about me? Don’t they love me? I’m all alone. All the people I love and in whom I have trusted have abandoned me!” The enemy then took advantage of this circumstance to impart an emotional lie deep into Jill’s heart, telling her, “The reason your parents aren’t here is that they don’t love or care about you. You are not important to them, and they will never come back to help you. You’re abandoned, and nobody will ever take care of you.”

 

 When Jill’s parents returned the next morning, they had no idea the terror she had lived through the night. They reassured her that they were there now and all would be well, but the damage had been done. The enemy had sown a “virus” of irrational fear of abandonment deep into Jill’s heart that persisted on into adulthood.

 

After the Lord brought this experience back to Jill’s memory, we were able to ask her to confess the deep feelings of fear to the Lord. We then asked Him what He had wanted to impart to her that night in the hospital when she was a little girl. That day Jill had an amazing encounter with the living, resurrected Lord Jesus Christ, who began to speak His truth to her. He removed the deep-seated fear and replaced it with total peace and security in His love. Perfect loves casts out fear (1 John 4:18). Jill later reported to us that since that time of ministry, she has never again experienced the fear of her husband being killed or not returning from a business trip. Nor has she been afraid that he would leave her for another woman.

Jill’s experience again emphasizes the power of a parent’s presence, touch, and comfort to bless the identity of a small child and bring a settled sense of peace and security. Even when it is no fault of the parents, the enemy can use their absence to impart a deep fear into the child’s heart. This is not something to be worried about but only to be aware of. Had Jill’s parents realized the emotional trauma she experienced as a little girl that night in the hospital, they could have prayed for her immdediately after the experience and removed the emotional lie and helped her open her heart to receive truth from the Lord. Such prayer would have spared her the pain of having ongoing fear of abandonment in her adult life.

 

God’s Protective Measures

In Ancient Hebrew Culture

 

Like all the other critical times of blessing in a child’s life, God gave us a model for blessing our children at infancy and early childhood within ancient Hebrew culture. I have identified four protective measures God placed within biblical Hebrew culture to ensure children were blessed and not cursed at infancy and early childhood.

 

1. The mother made the infant her top priority in life, not putting ministry, work outside the home, or anything else ahead 

    of the physical and emotional care of her children.

 

2. Children were weaned from breast-feeding at a later age, creating in the child a greater dependence upon the mother 

    and an ability to trust another person to meet their needs.

 

3. The cultural view of marriage as a covenant and children as a blessing from the Lord created a stable environment in        which the care and support of children was a priority in the family.

 

4. The regular practice of honoring the Sabbath as a family allowed parents to bless their children weekly throughout

    their growing-up years.

 

 I have already explained how the four attitudes and cultural practices mentioned above contributed to the impartation of blessing to small children. However, in today’s Western culture we see the opposite of theses ocurring. Many mothers are very busy with activities outside the home that make her unavailable to her child in early childhood. In addition, most mothers who breast-feed their infants will wean the baby within the first few months and work to make the child quite independent at an early age.

 

 In many families children are not really considered a blessing from the Lord. Parents may resent the fact that their time and energy must be diverted from making money, pursuing ministry, or some other significant activity to care for a small child. Since we have no regular time of weekly family blessing like the honoring of the Sabbath in ancient Hebrew culture, many children today never hear that their parents are pleased with them and believe they can succeed in life. Instead, with no regular time of blessing, children hear mostly words of correction and disappointment from their parents. In early childhood especially, the primary words children hear from their parents are: “No,” “Stop that,” “Shame on you,” “Bad boy/girl,” and “Don’t do that!”

 

 Imagine how much easier it would be to impart blessing to our children in infancy and early childhood if we were to reestablish in our families and communities some of the protective measures mentioned above. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if some of these practices from ancient Hebrew culture became “normal” to our children and grandchildren by the time they have their own children? It is possible. You can leave a legacy of blessing for your family. The blessing Toolbox will show you how.

 

*** Blessing Toolbox ***

 

Below are some prayers you can pray over your children during infancy and early childhood. These are meant to serve as a guide. You can personalize them as needed.

 

Remedial Prayers to Break the Curse

 

If your child was adopted and wasn’t nurtured in infancy

You may recognize that your child has a greater need for physical touch because he lacked nurture. Be sure to give him lots of appropriate physical attention and affection. You may also wish to pray the following over your child if he is still living in your home.

 

Father, we thank You for [your child’s name]. He is such a blessing to us. Lord, one of Your names is El Shaddai, the one who is more than enough. El Shaddai, we ask You to fill up [your child’s name]’s heart with Your love. Touch the heart of the little boy/girl deep inside who needs to be held, cuddled, and loved. Wrap him in Your arms right now and let him experience Your extravagant love and care for him.

 

I suggest that you now wait in silence and allow the Lord Himself to love your child. You may also want to hug and hold him as you pray. This is probably not something you’ll want to pray only once. You’ll likely want to repeat it regularly as your child grows up. After waiting before the Lord, you may want to bless your child with these words:

 

[Your child’s name], today we bless your infancy and childhood. We bless you with a supernatural security and a great ability to trust God your Father to meet all your needs. We bless you with an ability to trust other people and to know that you will never walk alone. God will always be with you. Today we declare that your heart shall be at rest in the knowledge that you are never alone. Almighty God will walk with you all the days of your life, and you can trust Him with every aspect of your life. We love you and declare over you that the heart of the small child within is blessed by God and shall be in total peace.

 

If your child is an adult, you may want to ask if he would be comfortable with you praying this prayer over him even now. The Lord can deeply touch the heart of an adult with His nurturing love many years after childhood.

 

If you weren’t there for your child in his infancy and you now notice that he has an inability to trust others

 

1. Repent before the Lord for not being available to nurture your child in infancy and early childhood.

 

Father, I acknowledge today that I was not available to provide the love and nurture my son/daughter needed as a small child. Lord, that was wrong, and I repent of not making [your child’s name] a priority in my life at that time. I can’t pay for any damage done to my child as a result of my actions. But Jesus Christ already paid for all my sin, shortcomings, faults, and mistakes. Because of Jesus’ blood, Father, I ask You to forgive me for any cursing of identity and lack of blessing that came to my son/daughter in early childhood as a result of my failure. Lord, I now ask that You would fill my son/daughter with Your love and nurture, and do for my child now what I did not do when [your child’s name] was small. I specifically ask You to give [your child’s name] a new ability to trust You and others to help meet his needs. I trust You, Lord, to do in my son/daughter those things that I cannot do. Amen.

 

2. You may now wish to pray the same prayer of blessing over your son/daughter as included above.

 

If you cursed the identity of your child during early childhood

 

1. Repent and ask God to forgive you.

 

Father, I acknowledge today that I cursed the identity of my son/daughter when he was a small child. Lord, that was wrong, and I repent of not being Your agent to impart Your message into [your child’s name]’s life at that time. I can’t pay for the damage done to my son/daughter as a result of my actions. But Jesus Christ already paid for all my sin, shortcomings, faults, and mistakes. Because of Jesus’ blood, Father, I ask You to forgive me for any cursing of identity and lack of blessing that came to my son/daughter in early childhood as a result of my failure. Lord, I now ask that You would fill my son/daughter with Your love and nurture and do for my child now what I did not do when he/she was small. I specifically ask You to give [your child’s name] a new ability to trust You and others to be available to him and meet his needs. I trust You, Lord, to do in my son/daughter those things that I cannot do.

 

2. You may now want to pray the same prayer over your child as included above.

 

Action Steps and Preventative Prayers

To Release the Blessing

 

As I mentioned previously, you can leave a legacy of blessing for your family. Take the steps below to not only bless your children in infancy and early childhood but also to establish a lifestyle of blessing in your family.

 

1. Establish a regular weekly time of blessing in your family. Follow the pattern outlined at the end of chapter 2 for     

    having a weekly meal and time of blessing.

 

2. Touch and hold your infant frequently. Breast-feeding helps create a secure bond between mother and child. If at all     

    possible, it would be wise for a mother to breast-feed her child. In any case, hold, cuddle, and give love to your child        throughout the early childhood years. When both parents hug and show appropriate physical affection, it tends to   

    enliven the spirit of the child. Make abundant use of physical expressions of love and blessing to your child.

 

3. Make meeting the needs of your small child a priority in your life. This tends to help establish basic trust in the child’s 

    heart. Doing this will also help you establish a culture of blessing in your family.

 

4. Speak a blessing over your child several times a day. You may want to speak a blessing like the one below over your

    child several times each day.

 

[Your child’s name], today I bless your life, spirit, soul, and body. I bless you with a supernatural security and a great ability to trust God your Father to meet all your needs. I bless you with an ability to trust other people and to know that you will never walk alone. God will always be with you. Today I declare that your heart shall be at rest in the knowledge that you are never alone but that Almighty God will walk with you all the days of your life. You can trust Him with every aspect of your life. [Your child’s name], as you grow, you shall increase in wisdom and stature, and find favor with God and man. I love you and declare that you shall prosper in all your ways all the days of your life.