Your heart has run straight home, and that is as it should be. Before you spread your hands wide for the whole field, you stoop to the little garden where your own dear ones dwell, and that is not selfishness, it is the order of grace. You have brought your father and your mother and laid them quietly before the Lord, and you have asked that He would be with them in their daily labor, and that He would save them. This is a prayer that smells of the family hearth; it has the warmth of a child's love upon it, and I cannot think the Lord will turn away from it.
I want you to remember that the salvation you are begging for them is no meager thing. It is not a mere ticket for heaven, a passport stamped and laid aside, but it is milk and wine for the soul. Milk, for the ordinary mornings when strength must be had for the day's work; wine, for the rare hours when the heart needs to be lifted and gladdened with something rich and old and full of promise. The gospel is exactly what your mother needs at her daily post, and exactly what your father requires when the weight of the job presses heavily. It is not a salvation that ignores the body or the workplace or the weariness of a long shift, it comes right down into all of that, a very present help. The Lord who saves is the Lord who stays with them at the job, and the people around them are not forgotten either, for you have prayed for them too. That is a wide and generous petition, and it is after the mind of Christ, who will have all men to be drawn to Him.
Perhaps you have sometimes lain awake and wondered whether your parents truly know the Lord, and the uncertainty has gnawed at you. But listen: Simeon was an old man, and the promise had tarried long, yet when the Spirit prompted him he went into the temple, and his eyes were not dim, they fastened at once upon the little Babe in the peasant woman's arms. He did not reason; he knew. And the Spirit who led Simeon is the same Spirit who broods over your household and is able to make your father and your mother see Jesus with a sudden clarity that no sermon could give them. Do not fret yourself into unbelief. The wind blows where it wills; you cannot command it, but you may spread the sails. Your prayers are the spreading of the sails. Leave the divine breath to do its own work.
It is no small thing that you have tasted the grace of God yourself and that your first instinct was to turn homeward with the news. That instinct is from the Lord. When Andrew found the Christ, his feet carried him straight to his brother Simon. When the jailer of Philippi believed, the next thing we read is that he and all his household were baptized that same night. Not because the man’s faith saved his children without their own believing, no, but because grace runs in the channels of love, and the father who has found mercy cannot rest until his household has found it too. Your longing for your parents is a little copy of God’s own longing over them, and you may take courage from that. The desire that burns in you did not self-kind; the great Father put it there.
So when you bow your head again, and you will, many times, do not pray as one who hopes against hope. Pray as one who knows that God has already taught His children this lesson: He alone is God, and beside Him there is none else. The idols we fear for others, the love of ease, the cares of this life, the pride that will not yield, He can break them with a word. And when He saves, He saves completely. He delivers from the guilt of the past, and He delivers from the power of present sin. That is what you are asking for your parents: not a half-salvation, not a harmless religion that leaves them in their trouble, but a full emancipation, a new creation, a light kindled in the heart that shines upon the desk and the duties and the weary hours and makes them all sacred. And the very fact that you cannot save them yourself is your peace, for you lean upon One who can.
Come, then, let us speak to Him together, for He is near.
Lord Jesus, You who came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance, look upon this dear one’s father and mother. You know their names, and You know the hidden life of their hearts. Be with them at their job; be a shield and a provider, and make their daily labor a place of peace. And more than that, O great Redeemer, step into their lives with the quiet footfall of mercy and show them Yourself, that they may see Your salvation and find in You all that their souls have ever sought. Save the people around them too, let the office or the workshop become a place where grace runs from desk to desk. And for this child who prays, give a calm assurance that the petitions are heard, and let there be a holy expectancy in the heart till the answer comes walking through the door. In Your own dear name, amen.
Prayer Focus: God, Thank You for loving me. Thank You for loving me, Jesus. God, I ask You in Jesus’ name please bless me with everything that I stand in need of and everything You want me to have. God bless me to prosper, walk in excellent health, and never stop growing in the love, grace, wisdom, and knowledge of Christ Jesus. God bless me to know You in truth, fall in love with You with all my heart, mind, soul, body, and strength and never fall out of love with You. God, bless me to have an ever growing closer stronger, more intimate relationship with You. Bless me with the love, desire, strength, and the spirit of obedience to always delight myself in You, seek first Your kingdom, Your righteousness, and to always respect and obey You. Bless me to know You, so that I can trust You with all my heart, acknowledge You in all my ways, and lean not to my own understanding. Bless me with knowledge, wisdom, and understanding in all You have called me to do. 
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