Unless the Lord ….. (IV) Children, spiritual and natural

“Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb is a reward” (Psalm 127:3), “Sing, O barren ….. for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married says the Lord” (Isaiah 54:1). The assumption in both of these verses, is that the Lord is very much involved in the lives of the (spiritual and natural) parents. And it matters not whether you came to Lord early in parenthood, or late. In particular, the promise of fruitfulness is to those who love the Lord and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28,29). Now whether for good or evil, the spiritual “DNA” of the parents is visited (as in deeply influences) the DNA of the Children.

We will need to revisit this spiritual principle from Exodus 20:5,6), but for this morning I want to say that the “Unless the Lord” of Psalm 127:1 makes all the difference. In particular when at any stage, we turn to the Lord in repentance to love and obey Him, then we are in essence standing in the gap for our (spiritual and natural) children (Exodus 20:5,6 again). And the difference is that in this scenario we can claim the promise that “He will restore the years that the locus have eaten” (Joel 2:25). There were four different kinds of locusts bringing ever increasing devastation. About this, we read in Joel 1:4 that “What the chewing locust left, the swarming locust has eaten; What the swarming locust left, the crawling locust has eaten; And what the crawling locust left, the consuming locust has eaten.” But God …, “unless the Lord ….”

Though none of us is perfect (James 3:2), nevertheless most parents do the very, very best we can with “the hand” we were dealt. When we see our children ill for example, most of us would gladly take their place if it were possible. In addition, we do our best to raise up our children in the way we think they should go. And again when we turn to the Lord, be it early or late, we can claim “when he is old he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6). Many times, in the meantime we see the very opposite. But it strikes me again this morning, that whether our current influence be great or small, the promise still stands of His steadfast love to them, and to the generations that follow (Exodus 20:6). And it also strikes me this morning, that it was knowing how we feel about our children, knowing it would motive us to make the necessary changes that the Lord initiated this reality.

Father, it seems to be very common, that we either take too much responsibility or too little. Some of us need to speak more, and some of us need to speak less. Also Lord for those of us who have the gift of the gab the latter scenario is hard, so please help us. But in any case Father, I pray again the prayer I have often prayed that I may speak every word that You want me to speak, neither one word more, nor one word less. And when we do speak Lord, let it be full of grace and seasoned with salt (Colossians 4:6) in Jesus Name Amen