Silas
Beloved of All
Thank you for sharing your heart and for trusting us to pray with you. The burden you carry for your children is very real, and the grief of losing their father so recently makes it even heavier. It is right to be concerned when you see alcohol, cigarettes and drugs taking hold, especially when one son is already facing serious health problems like fatty liver, trouble at work, and the great danger of driving while under the influence, and when faith itself seems to have grown cold.
We want you to know that God sees your family and hears your cry. Scripture shows that God sometimes allows His people to come to a place where there seems to be no way out, with the sea in front and an enemy behind, so that He alone can make a way where there is no way and show His power to deliver. What feels like a trap to you is not beyond His reach. He is still the God who brings His people out with a mighty hand, and He is able to deliver your sons from bondage that looks impossible to break.
The Bible also teaches that patterns of sin can be visited upon children, and we see this plainly when addiction runs in a family. Children suffer because of the choices of parents, sometimes even from birth. That does not mean your children are without hope or without responsibility before God, but it does help explain why these chains feel so strong from one generation to the next. The Lord wants to protect and redeem His children, and He calls parents to keep crying out to Him for that redemption. When His people cried out under oppression, He raised up a deliverer for them, and He still responds to the earnest cries of those who call on Him through Jesus Christ, who alone is the way of salvation.
Healing and deliverance do not always come in an instant. In the Gospels there is an account where healing came gradually, step by step, and all healing, whether sudden or slow, is from the Lord. Do not be discouraged if you do not see complete change overnight. At the same time Scripture warns that unbelief can limit what God does among His people. That is why a simple, childlike faith is so precious. Pray with that kind of simple trust, believing that God can do what no person can do, while also taking wise and practical steps. Encourage your sons to seek medical help for the liver disease and for the addictions, urge the one who drives under the influence to stop for his own safety and the safety of others, and seek godly counsel and support from mature believers who can walk with you. Love must not enable destructive behavior.
God also gave His people ways to keep His deliverance before the next generation, even forming questions for children to ask so parents could answer by telling what the Lord had done. Your own relationship with God cannot save your children for them, each must turn to the Lord themselves, but your faithful witness matters. Keep telling them what God has done for you, how He brought you through, and that He can do the same for them. Keep praying for their faith to be awakened again, for the son who has lost direction to turn back to the Lord, and for all of them to come to know Jesus as Savior.
We are praying with you for this. We ask the Lord to have mercy on your sons, to convict them of their need for Jesus, to break the power of alcohol, cigarettes and drugs, to heal the body that has been damaged, to protect them and others from harm, to restore faith where it has grown cold, and to break the cycle that has weighed on your family. We pray that He will give you strength, peace and wisdom as you continue to intercede, and that He will guard your own heart from fear. He is able to make a way, and He invites you to keep bringing your children before Him in prayer.
We want you to know that God sees your family and hears your cry. Scripture shows that God sometimes allows His people to come to a place where there seems to be no way out, with the sea in front and an enemy behind, so that He alone can make a way where there is no way and show His power to deliver. What feels like a trap to you is not beyond His reach. He is still the God who brings His people out with a mighty hand, and He is able to deliver your sons from bondage that looks impossible to break.
The Bible also teaches that patterns of sin can be visited upon children, and we see this plainly when addiction runs in a family. Children suffer because of the choices of parents, sometimes even from birth. That does not mean your children are without hope or without responsibility before God, but it does help explain why these chains feel so strong from one generation to the next. The Lord wants to protect and redeem His children, and He calls parents to keep crying out to Him for that redemption. When His people cried out under oppression, He raised up a deliverer for them, and He still responds to the earnest cries of those who call on Him through Jesus Christ, who alone is the way of salvation.
Healing and deliverance do not always come in an instant. In the Gospels there is an account where healing came gradually, step by step, and all healing, whether sudden or slow, is from the Lord. Do not be discouraged if you do not see complete change overnight. At the same time Scripture warns that unbelief can limit what God does among His people. That is why a simple, childlike faith is so precious. Pray with that kind of simple trust, believing that God can do what no person can do, while also taking wise and practical steps. Encourage your sons to seek medical help for the liver disease and for the addictions, urge the one who drives under the influence to stop for his own safety and the safety of others, and seek godly counsel and support from mature believers who can walk with you. Love must not enable destructive behavior.
God also gave His people ways to keep His deliverance before the next generation, even forming questions for children to ask so parents could answer by telling what the Lord had done. Your own relationship with God cannot save your children for them, each must turn to the Lord themselves, but your faithful witness matters. Keep telling them what God has done for you, how He brought you through, and that He can do the same for them. Keep praying for their faith to be awakened again, for the son who has lost direction to turn back to the Lord, and for all of them to come to know Jesus as Savior.
We are praying with you for this. We ask the Lord to have mercy on your sons, to convict them of their need for Jesus, to break the power of alcohol, cigarettes and drugs, to heal the body that has been damaged, to protect them and others from harm, to restore faith where it has grown cold, and to break the cycle that has weighed on your family. We pray that He will give you strength, peace and wisdom as you continue to intercede, and that He will guard your own heart from fear. He is able to make a way, and He invites you to keep bringing your children before Him in prayer.
