Understanding through the “what.”

Have you as parents encountered the what? As your child begin to speak, and from the moment they demonstrate awareness, or the one that we are able to notice, our children seem to repeat the what.

Go back to game of “peek a boo”, when they turn their heads to your voice and fix their eye on you they have been attuning to what. What they see, hear, smell, taste, touch and some might say conscious of. Identifying what seems to be associated with attachment as they start recognizing Mom and Dad’s voice, their bottle, the discomfort in their pamper or clothing. This awareness is fascinating to us as this little person takes hold of awareness.

As this awareness grows the “what” questions appears to magnifies exponentially. Seems like they ask what for everything they see, starting with gestures and then speech. “What is that?” That’s a cow my dear. This one is a horse and that is a chicken. Then it seems the lines blur because our little ones ask what, again and again and again for the same items. Is it because they don’t remember or because the orientation, variation, environment or some subtle aspect of the creature and their environment has changed? The curiosity can be relentless in pursuit of the truth.

his innocence can be baffling to parents and sibling and even annoying to some. Is as if it is an aspect of being a child and critical in a sense to finding and knowing the truth about a thing through people they trust and recognize. Those through who the source of the what has been trust worthily and consistent. It even appears that when the question is asked by them we are drawn to tell the truth due to the very nature in which it is asked. Knowing that this type of wanting to identify is not to be fooled with at least not initially. Older siblings may test this concept until the one seeking the answer will start turning to a more trust worthily source.

The responsibility is on us as parents, teachers, leaders and elders to lead our little ones toward truth. Raising them in truth is critical to their development and could be a matter of life and death or a matter of life that is chosen. As they grow they appear to ask us less and less, making us more and more curious where their source of truth comes from. This is why the word, the law, and the love should come through the right source. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ through whom all things are made whole. There is only one truth.

What is cultural freedom and finding your own truth. What appears to be innocent in practice can be deadly as the child pulls “truth” from all sorts of sources with no root or rooted in untruth, evil. The teen years into early adulthood appears to be an ideal age to impart truth but the truth is that knowing the source of truth maybe just as important. I have no condemnation in what I am saying, only the call to look at the sources of “truth” we allow our children to drink from…

The “What” of a thing is usually attached to its verb or the “doing” and even larger into systems that form process, habits, and into way of life or lack thereof. Question for us: What is innocence and is it something in need of our protection? How can we protect something if we ourselves possibly don’t have it? Will we even be able to recognize it?

Let’s not get in the way of our children finding the “Truth.”

“Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.”
‭‭John‬ ‭14:6‬ ‭NLT‬‬
https://bible.com/bible/116/jhn.14.6.NLT