God’s plan for our children is perfect. He devised a family unit where children receive a foundation of faith, knowing they need to be connected to Him to steer through life’s decisions and challenges.
What happens when your children reject what they've been taught and live a lifestyle that breaks your heart to pieces? Have you agonized as your child, whom you raised to love God, now laughs at your faith or mocks God’s Word in determined rebellion?
Numerous parents have had to come to grips with the reality of errant children. For many, just the mention of their child's name is an embarrassment. Others see their children as a puzzle to fix if they can just find the missing piece. Worrying about their children's eternal salvation is exhausting. So God beckons us, “Come unto me, all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28, NIV).
God can offer us rest because He is familiar with wayward children. “We're all like sheep who've wandered off and gotten lost. We've all done our own thing, gone our own way” (Isaiah 53:6, MSG). One thing is certain—God never leaves the side of wayward children or their broken-hearted parents. He understands a greater depth of pain as the parent of the first wayward children and every child since.
In the final chapter of her book, When Your Child Turns from God, author Dorothy Watts speaks from personal experience as she outlines seven reasons parents of prodigals should hope for the return of their children1:
1. God’s ability to work depends on His resources, not ours.
2. God can use anything to accomplish His purpose for our children.
3. Whether we see Him or not, God is working.
4. Our children cannot stray beyond the reach of God.
5. God doesn’t view time as we view it.
6. We serve a God who gives second chances.
7. God will keep on working, even after we are gone.
Watts also shares research by author Tom Bisset and Focus on the Family that offers hope to parents of prodigals. Bisset refers to several peak times in the “returning curve.”2 One occurs during their mid-20s, when young adults are establishing career, home, and family. Watts shares how Bisset’s discovery is substantiated by a Focus on the Family survey which also revealed that 85 percent of wayward children return to their parents’ religious faith and values by their mid-20s.
Bisset found the next stage of return is around the age of 40, as the children of prodigals enter their teen years. It is a time when parents are challenged to re-evaluate the direction of their own lives and look again into spiritual values.
Illness or other tragedy causes individuals to be introspective. The reality that they are not going to live forever hits home, maybe for the first time. A parent’s death also offers an opportunity for re-evaluation.
An anonymous story circulated on the Internet a few years ago about a young man who grew weary of the life he had chosen for himself. He longed for the comfort and security he remembered from his childhood—comfort in the arms of loving parents, and comfort surrounded by the assurances of a caring and forgiving heavenly Father.
Day after day, the young man’s mother made trips to the mailbox, hoping beyond hope for a letter from her precious boy. Opening the box one day, she squinted inside. There was a small envelope in the back. She reached for it, not letting her heart be hopeful, for it had been broken so many times. As she retrieved the plain white envelope from the mailbox, tears began to flow as she recognized the almost-forgotten penmanship of her boy.
Eagerly she tore open the envelope and then fell to her knees with prayerful thanksgiving as she read the words, “I want to come home.” Through tear-filled eyes she read his humble request for re-admittance into the family. He identified a time when he would be riding the train that passed the back of their property on its way through town. He would look out the window for a sign that he was forgiven—a white streamer tied around the largest oak tree in back of their home.
The mother had forgiven him long ago, and now it was time to make sure he got off that train. She ran from door to door with hands full of white streamers, sharing the story of her son’s return.
As the train approached the boy's hometown, he knew what lay ahead would shape his future. Anxiously he rose and stood by the window looking intently so he would not miss the big oak tree. He was not prepared for what he saw and was overcome with joy. Home after home diplayed signs of forgiveness as hundreds of white streamers fluttered in the wind. He was home. All was forgiven.
Parents of prodigals, never give up hope. God is planning a wonderful homecoming, and He wants each of your children—His children—there with you. Bring your painful petitions to a Father who understands. Rely on the promises found in His Word, then wait on the Lord. He will give you peace and strengthen your broken hearts. “Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart, wait, I say, on the Lord” (Ps. 27:14, NKJV).
1 Dorothy M. Watts, When Your Child Turns From God (Hagerstown, MD: Review & Herald Publishing Association, 1996), 99-106.
2 Tom Bisset, Why Christian Kids Leave the Faith (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1992), 146-151.
Diane Thurber is the Lake Union Herald managing editor and a certified family life educator
