Prayers of Blessing Over My Adult ChildrenPrimjer

Godly parents do not guarantee godly children. The Lord has granted each of us the incredible gift of freedom of choice, or, as the theologians call it, “human free will,” and inherent in that gift is the potential for right choices and wrong choices. Had the Lord not granted free will, humans never could have brought full joy to their Creator.

When God created Adam and Eve, they were without sin and perfect, but they used their free will to directly disobey the Lord by eating fruit from the forbidden tree. They didn’t have a fallen nature at that point. Yet they sinned. Think about this situation even deeper: God was their parent who loved them with an incalculable love. Perfect environment. Perfect parent. Perfect children. But the perfect parent witnessed the imperfect choice of major sin with terrible consequences.

Can you accept fully that we have been given by Almighty God the freedom to choose? We must embrace this reality in the lives of our children. They alone are responsible for their choices as adults, and they may choose to disobey God any time they so desire.

Just this morning I’ve been rereading for the umpteenth time the life stories of the godly kings of Judah recorded in 1 Kings 15–22 and 2 Kings 18–23, as well as in the related passages in 2 Chronicles. I’ve always found valuable insights when reflecting on these outstanding kings of Judah: Asa, Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah, and Josiah. But one thing surfaces over and over again—sometimes these godly kings had fathers who were the most ungodly, and sometimes the godliest fathers had very wicked sons. How can this be? 

When you study all the nineteen kings of Israel (all wicked) and the twenty kings of Judah (eight were godly), one thing is unmistakable: Godly parents do not guarantee godly offspring, and ungodly parents do not guarantee ungodly offspring. All of us wish that God would guarantee if we raised our children in the “fear and admonition of the Lord” that all our children would choose to live a godly life. Thankfully, many do; tragically, many do not.

All of us at times wish that parenting had a written guarantee. If we as parents do X, then our children will do Y. But if you’ve made this desire into a belief, stop. Stop and never again embrace this lie. Anyone at any time and in any place is free to make right decisions and is free to make wrong decisions. Never again reach out and grab the responsibility for your children’s decisions and actions.

I’ve found it very helpful to reflect even more deeply on this truth. God is our heavenly Father and intervenes in our lives as our perfect parent to help us desire the straight and narrow way. He rarely, if ever, overthrows our freedom to choose—because He honors the gift of our own choices. When we choose to disobey, He disciplines us with rebukes, chastening, and according to Hebrews 12, even with most painful scourging.

But God also reveals that any of us can harden our hearts against His love, His rebukes, His convictions, His chastening, and His scourging—and continue in sin. In other words, even our heavenly parent experiences the grief of His born-again children living in direct disobedience to Him. God never accepts responsibility for His children’s choices. That’s why God said, “I was crushed by their adulterous heart which has departed from Me” (Ezekiel 6:9 NKJV), and the New Testament commands us not to “grieve the Holy Spirit” (Ephesians 4:30). Why? Because our freedom to choose permits us to bring either great joy or grief to our heavenly Father.

Freedom of choice—the most wonderful and most terrible of all God’s gifts to mankind. May your children, and may our children, choose to use that gift to run hard after the Lord. If not, may we continue to love them, care for them, and most of all, pray for them!

Lord, You are our heavenly Father. You intervene in all of our lives as our perfect parent to help us desire and live out the path of wisdom. I know You do not overthrow our freedom to choose, and it must break Your heart to see wrong or poor choices. That is why You discipline us with rebuke, chastening, and even pain. You want us all to learn how to make wise choices in life. I know that despite our best efforts as parents, anyone can harden their heart against You. Anyone can turn a deaf ear to Your chastening and convictions. Free will means just that—free will. You never accept responsibility for Your children’s choices when they go against You. Neither should I accept responsibility for my adult children’s choices. They are free to choose as they do, and then live with the results of those choices. In Jesus’ name, amen.