Words of truth, words of life

 Each of my daughters has such a different personality including various strengths and struggles. Righteous has battled fears from as long as I can remember. I never realized that I was attributing to this until the other day. She knew we were planning on getting her 10 year booster shots and her anxiety about this was really crippling. She was talking to Chrissy Kelly about how nervous she was about going to the doctor. Chrissy was trying to encourage her- that there are many things that she is very brave about it. Righteous refused Chrissy's words and told her that all of  her younger sister's were the brave ones, she is the scared one.

How my heart sank to hear this.

 Righteous just accepted this as her reality. The horrible part is- she has heard me say those exact words to so many people. When we are in town with visitors- and Righteous starts to panic from a crazy man approaching us, I always make a joke that my oldest has more fears that her little sisters. The Lord strongly convicted me that my words need to speak life over my daughter. I had been speaking words of fear about Righteous's identity and the Bible says she can  "Fear Not for God has Redeemed her" and that "God has commanded us to be strong and have great courage, to not be afraid or dismayed for He is with us wherever we go". I want to try harder to help her fight this and my words are powerful. I apologized to her and asked her to forgive me. She didn't even think that I had done anything wrong that was needing an apology. That is the type of kind hearted young lady she is.

On the day of the vaccines her stomach was hurting her because of all the worrying. We sat in the waiting room and her sisters were being their playful giggling selves and Righteous was pouting. Then we got called to see the doctor. Righteous began moaning and groaning. I sat next to her as the shots were administered and she was already crying before it made it in her skin. But when it was finished she said "that didn't her too bad". We were able to explain that often times we build up the fears in our heads to be far worse than they really are. When we face them we can find victory over them. She believes she will not cry the next time that she needs a vaccine. I believe her. I will speak truth over her. I will speak life.