Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

The Tree

David writes this about himself, but it applies with equal weight to every child you are raising. Each one was possessed, covered, and formed by God himself before birth, fearfully and wonderfully made, a specific, deliberate creation, not a generic template you are simply responsible for filling in as you see fit.

This should shape how you view the specific temperament, gifts, and even struggles of each child in your care. They were not accidentally assembled. They were fearfully and wonderfully made, by the same God who is also entrusting them to you, not for you to reshape entirely into someone else, but to raise well as who they actually, deliberately were made to be.

This is a needed corrective against parenting that quietly tries to remake a child into a different kind of person entirely, perhaps modeled after yourself, or after a sibling, or after some idealized version you had imagined before this child’s actual, specific personality became clear. God made this specific child, fearfully and wonderfully, on purpose.

Look at your child today, specifically, and notice one aspect of who they actually are, not who you wish they were, and receive it as fearfully and wonderfully made, God’s own deliberate design, worth raising well rather than working to erase.