Redemption Story
“Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever.”
1 John 2:15-17
As a parent, I think we can all agree that one of our biggest hopes is that we are able to provide for our children better than what we had ourselves.
For me, having better is having Jesus.
I was not raised in a “none” household. There was no going to church, no praying, no even mention of God until my friends started to ask me questions at school to which I didn’t have an answer for. I tried asking questions at home, but the concepts of “god” and “heaven” were no more valid for one religion than the next, and I was basically raised being taught that everyone has different beliefs and that’s just the way the world turns. In fact, despite multiple religions, my mom assured me that there was a heaven and everyone goes there when they die, regardless of what they believe.
(Now, I hope as you are reading this you are able to discern the lies here and how contradictory that is to what the Bible actually says.)
As I went through life living on this faulty understanding of God and religious freedom, I was lost because my life had no purpose. I was floating through life, being pushed by the waves of the world, from one storm to the next. Eventually, the storm of my life came crashing down and I found myself in a hole of depression at the age of 21, wondering why I was feeling so sad and lonely when I was doing all of the things the world told me I needed to do in order to find “friends” and “happiness”.
It was at that moment of despair that I realized my need for Jesus.
Now, I don’t know your story, but I’m assuming that somewhere along the way you also experienced your own hurt, heart ache, and struggles that only brought you closer to Jesus as well.
This is the hard part about parenting. (Especially teenagers)
We want to save our children from those same mistakes and heartache. We know the ways of the world lead to emptiness and bad consequences. We know the way and we so badly just want to take our children down the road of blessings.Unfortunately, as the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink.
We can set boundaries and have expectations, but it is important to remember that when your kids stray, tempted by the “lusts of the world”, to love them through it.
God will use their experiences as a part of their story for His glory, the same way He did for you and me.
“Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever.”
(1 John 2:15-17)