I don’t know about you, but I tend to get exposed when I am least expecting it. We can get exposure to the sun which can be harmful, we can get exposure to poisonous fumes or gases that equally are not good for us but sometimes we can get exposed emotionally when a circumstance triggers a deep feeling. The latter happened to me yesterday.

Having recently lost my husband (although he is far from being lost as he is in heavenly places with Jesus which must be wonderful for him) and having my dear Mum living in our home has suddenly exposed the fact that my Mike isn’t here. We usually have a carer for Mum who comes into the home regularly but since last Friday we’ve had no carer and I’ve been trying to juggle all sorts of things around. Then, I find I’m very tired – so try to sleep only to have broken nights as I’ve experienced ever since Mike went to be with the Lord. So am trying to come to terms with my exposed emotions and see how God will take me through this situation.

What about children when they go through emotional turmoil and exposure? What about Henry? Here in England, we have a radio serial (that is on most days just for 15 minutes). There has been an incident in this (the vital episode I happened to miss) where a lady has been emotionally abused by husband and she got so irate after months and months of exposure to this that she stabbed him. Little Henry, her 5 year old son, was in the house when it happened. Fortunately, in this fictional story, he has stable grandparents while his mother is  in custody and heavily pregnant (due anytime). Dear Henry may have many emotional scars and could get more when he hears more snippets of what happened let alone what he might have seen and witnessed. How do children deal with their emotional baggage when exposed to such awful situations? The hugs and understanding of close relatives can help a bit.

There is only one remedy for this that I know of and that is for children to come to their Heavenly Father and tell Him all about how they feel. They will need help to express their feelings as they so often lie dormant or can’t be expressed verbally. Just coming to One who knows and loves them can really help. How grandparents who have faith in God can help here. In Book 1 of ‘The Creation Series’ there is an illustration of children sitting in a Father’s lap. That’s how we can come to God, whether we’re adults or children.

Wrong exposure can draw us to being exposed to the love of God who can handle all our emotions and even heal the memories of them. Let’s encourage our children to come to their solid, strong Father as we run to Him, too, as without Him we can do nothing.  We can’t even untangle the memories and deep emotions we have – so let’s hand them over to the One who can manage them all. After all. we can come to Him as children!