Helping autistic children hear God’s voice

I vividly remember a conversation I had with a 14-year-old boy, I was supporting who didn’t want to go into the teaching at an event I was helping at because ‘God didn’t speak to him’. As I paced around the nearby field with him in sight of the marquee, we chatted about what he was finding difficult. He is autistic and felt very strongly that he should be able to hear God’s voice just as you or I may speak to one another.

We had a great conversation around the fact that although God can speak in many different ways, and sometimes people do hear his audible voice, there are other ways we can hear him too. It led me to reflect quite a lot on how we support our children and young people to learn about chatting to God and hearing from him, particularly when the concept is not very literal.

We all have different ways that we hear from God and speak to him. I feel like God mainly speaks to me through putting words and pictures in my head which I wasn’t thinking about before asking him to speak.

What a brilliant heavenly father we have who relates to us and wants to have a relationship with us as individuals with our own unique personalities

This week I was encouraged as I prayed for someone and found that the story of Joshua popped into my head so I prayed that God would speak to them about Joshua and that they would know his boldness. As I finished praying the lady I was praying for said that God had been talking to her about Joshua on her journey home just before we prayed.

Often, I have found that children and young people with additional needs, and particularly autistic individuals, can find it hard to understand the concept of God speaking. I firmly believe that everyone can hear from God and that he speaks to each and every one of us, in fact I know I’ve had some profound moments of encounter with God as he’s spoken to me through children and young people with additional needs.

As parents we can encourage our children and young people that God can speak to them. Parenting for Faith have some brilliant resources around this, in particular ‘Chat and Catch’. I recommend looking at their resources, parent stories and additional needs section too.

Read more:

8 multi-sensory ways to encourage your children to pray

6 things Christian parents can do whilst they wait for their child’s Autism diagnosis

One thing that I’ve found helpful is to try and explore different ways that we connect with God in prayer together. It’s okay for our children and young people to ask questions. We can give our children opportunities to experience a different perspective and explore together the ways that God speaks through each of our senses. You can see more practical ideas of this in my previous article about sensory processing and using our senses to pray.

When I’m supporting autistic children and young people to give this a go I often try and do a regulating activity with them first – trying to help them to move their body or do some ‘heavy work’ which helps them to feel more grounded. They can learn about chat and catch whilst walking round a field, bouncing on a gym ball or throwing and catching it with me, or whilst climbing at a playground.

Often it can be difficult for children to think about speaking to God in their heads

Here, we’re going to focus in on what it looks like to try and learn Chat and Catch and to practice hearing God’s voice together, particularly if our child is autistic.

The principle of Chat and Catch is that you can tell God specific things and ask him specific questions. I often start with very literal statements and very literal questions. This is because these questions are often easily answered by things that we’re thinking about which can be helpful particularly for autistic individuals. By inviting God into this space, we can start to explore how he might be speaking to us in our day to day. If the answer is something that doesn’t contradict the character of God, then I would always presume that God is speaking about that.

I once had a three-year-old who every week for weeks on end told me that God spoke to them about a purple dinosaur. I thought that was great! What a brilliant heavenly father we have who relates to us and wants to have a relationship with us as individuals with our own unique personalities.

Chat

Often it can be difficult for children to think about speaking to God in their heads. In many situations I suggest that children and adults hold their hands to their mouth and whisper what they want to say to God into their hands or maybe write it down.

• Tell God what you had for breakfast
• Tell God your favourite colour
• Tell God your favourite car/ truck/ doll etc.
• Tell God what you did today

Catch

By praying first and asking God to fill our minds and thoughts we can trust that God is speaking as we learn to listen to him. Things that I might ask God are:

• ’What colour do you want me to think about God?’ ‘Why that colour?’
• ’What game do you want to play with me God?’ ‘Why that game?’
• ’Where do you want to go with me God?’ ‘Why there?’
• You can also make it specific to your child’s interests ‘which car do you want to talk to me about God? Why that car?’

In my family we sometimes practice this around the table. Often my daughter will decide what the question we’re asking God is. We’ve had all sorts of questions! One question that we’ve asked God is ‘pizza or burger God? And why?’. I’m often amazed that I feel like God still speaks to each of us even through the everyday questions when we invite him into that space.

As we practice Chat and Catch our children can learn more and more how to hear God’s voice. As they learn this can then ask God more broad, less specific questions. We could still do this whilst helping our child with regulating movement activities. For example, giving our child a big hug and asking God to speak to them about his big love, knocking down a tower or blowing bubbles together and asking God what he’s saying.

Through giving our children and young people practical tools which enable them to explore and access the place in their mind that they may be able to hear God’s voice and learning to invite him into the picture they can then grow in their relationship with Jesus. My prayer is that through some of the ideas above both you and your child can continue to walk more closely with God.