by Pat Lamb Author of: Let the Children Come; Children, Come to Me; When the Stars Fall Down; Widening the Church Doors to Teach the Narrow Way; My Thinking Book; Love is…) Available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and patlambchristianauthor.com
Train up a child…
Do You Have a Gifted Child?
Do you sometimes weary of hearing parents and grandparents talk about how smart a child is? Then, they continue to tell of some of the many marvelous things that child can do such as read or count at a younger age than other children, say extremely intelligent things, or memorize quickly. As we listen, we know very well that the child may or may not be gifted academically, but it seems to be a common dream of most adults to have a “really smart child”.
It is true that there are children who are gifted intellectually and can think quickly and reason easily. It would seem that most of us think of a gifted child as being gifted in the intellectual field only.
In truth, every child is gifted in one area or another. It is too bad that we often don’t seem to recognize gifts other than the ones that make a child look really smart. Every child is born with certain hereditary tendencies or preferences. These special interests are the hereditary gifts of the child given by God. After the child makes its appearance into the world, it may or may not be gifted with loving and caring parents to nurture and appreciate the hereditary abilities.
Some children are born with gifted ability in math. Some are born with gifted ability with words, pictures, body usage (such as sports), social skills, introspective skills, and music skills. The world needs all of these abilities. To say that the intellectual ability is the most important is to not understand the importance of the other gifts. The math and word skills are the skills identified with the intellect, but in God’s eyes, each person is of equal value and He loves each person equally. Should we adults not do the same?
While children are born with three or four of the gifts named, unfortunately they are not always born with the gift of a parent’s love. Every parent can give the gift of love that includes patience and understanding of a child. One reason parents do not give that gift of love is that the parent may value one of the hereditary gifts more than another. To value one gift over another in children can be very damaging. It can lead to preferring one child over another. We tend to favor those who have the same gifts that we have. This should not be so. Adults need to recognize the value of all of the gifts. Instead of encouraging a child, some parents harangue a child for not living up to that parent’s expectations. We need to recognize that there is a plan for each person’s life and it may not necessarily be the plan we have for that life.
A truly gifted child is the child who recognizes his/her abilities, whatever they may be, and has parents who also recognize and appreciate the way the child was created. The Bible tells us that children are a gift from God. God gifts the parents with the child and He gifts the child with certain abilities. His plan is to gift the child also with parents who are thankful for the child that was given to them. Every parent has a gifted child from God. Parents need to further gift that child with their love.