Spiritual Battles

It has been a crazy/busy week.  I have had somewhere to be every night this week and things to be done during my lunch break (like calling USCIS to get the boy's CoC debacle straightened out).  So, I haven't had the time to blog.  But today, I am making the time.

Yesterday, we had our first "incident".  CP took all 6 kids to the beach.  After about four hours, the kids were hot and tired and ready to head home.  CP and one of the boys were in the water waiting for the last wave when "it" happened.  Two of the boys got into a fight.  What exactly prompted the fight isn't exactly clear due to communication issues. From there, it escalated into a full blown fight with numerous punches being thrown.  CP arrived on the beach just as it was winding down and he separated the boys. 

He took one into the water to help him wash up and talk to him.  Then he took the other into the water to do the same.  They all then returned home and called me with the news.  We decided that it was best to let everyone calm down and to address the issue after dinner.  In the meantime, we also contacted a friend who speaks Chinese to ask him translate for us so we would know what happened without the confusion of electronic translators.  Before long, the two boys were talking, playing, and hanging out together. 

After dinner, we spoke to each boy individually.  The first person to put hands on the other person was easily determined.  Then, the instigator was asked if he wanted to apologize.  He did willingly and got a hug from the other boy.  Later that evening, the instigator wanted to talk to us some more about what happened.  More details were revealed that put a different light on what happened.  It wasn't pretty. 

We had something special planned this weekend through church.  It was a last minute offer from a teacher at church (Praise God!) that offset the cost of the event (and it wasn't cheap!)  It was now questionable if the instigator would be allowed to attend.  My gut reaction was 'No way' - why should he be allowed to participate in this fun event given what had happened.  I continued to pray about it before bed and again this morning. 

God finally spoke to me that this "physical battle" that occurred on the beach is just the manifestation of the spiritual battle that is going on for our kids.  This was confirmed to me when I walked in the boys' room and saw a Frank Peretti book laying on their floor.  He was the author who opened my eyes to all of the things that happen in the spiritual realm that manifest themselves in our physical realm. 

I am now convinced that the instigator MUST attend this special event.  God has something for him there.  If we prevented him from attending as a result of this incident, then S*t*n would have won this time.  I don't know what God has for him, but it must be pretty good if S*t*n went to these lengths to try and keep him from going. 

Oh yeah, he didn't get away with it.  The instigator will be grounded all next week and won't get to go to the beach on Thursday with the family.  He'll have to stay home with Grandpa.