70-75 percent of young adults
leave the church after high
school. The question most parents ask when confronted with
the reality that their child has left
the faith is, “What about Proverbs 22:6 – “raise up a child in
the way he should go and when
he is old, he will not depart from
it.”?
The truth is there is no
simple answer for a parent who
invokes this passage amidst the
confusion of being informed that
a once believing child no longer
believes. The answer to this
question does exist, however,
it is scattered throughout scripture and reveals the importance
of seeking the whole counsel of
God, found from Genesis through
Revelation, and not building doctrine on one verse. Often, when
an adult or teen child declares
his departure from the faith, the
parent begins the blame game.
Parents blame themselves, the
school system, the culture and
even God. Surely, bewildered
parents sometimes deduce, if
Proverbs 22:6 is true and the
Bible is to be trusted, something
must have gone very wrong.
Proverbs 22:6 does not deal with
individual salvation and was written before there was salvation
through the blood of Christ. The
Bible does, in fact, provide many
promises concerning salvation,
but each promise is directed to
individuals about themselves.
Acts 2:38 says, “Repent and
be baptized for the remission of
sin”, John 3:16 tells us “Whosoever believeth... shall have eternal live”, and Joshua charged
the Israelites with “choose this
day whom you will serve...” In
every case, belief is an individual choice that must be made
for oneself. Even under the best
of circumstances, a child may
choose to walk away or reject
God.
SURELY THE PARENT IS TO
BLAME...RIGHT?
God’s own “son” Adam rejected
His authority in the Garden
of Eden. In Luke’s lineage of
Christ, Luke 3:38 calls Adam the
son of God. Did God not raise up
Adam in the way he should go,
did God somehow fail to model
holiness or provide an environment conducive to Adam’s spiritual security? To believe that
God somehow failed Adam is the
height of folly but demonstrates
that the free will of our children
trumps our best efforts, even as
Adam defied God in the best of
circumstances. No one had a
better shot at serving God than
Adam; yet, he exercised his free
will and followed the influence
of someone else in his life, Eve.
Adam was not even tempted by
Satan, he succumbed to peer
pressure.
Everything in our
society is working against the
message of the cross. Even
Christian colleges are beginning
to question foundational truths
found in scripture, undermining
the best efforts of parents and
youth pastors. Simply put, every
child must make the choice to
follow God or to not follow God.
As believers, we can teach our
children, we can pray for them,
we can lead them on the right
path, but ultimately, they will
have to choose Christ, on their
own. It’s been said that God
has no grandchildren and each
person, regardless of the faith of
parents, must be born again of
their own volition. No parent is
perfect and every parent makes
mistakes rearing children but at
judgment day, every one of us
stands before God with no one
to blame for our actions and
decisions. This may seem harsh
when one’s own child is at stake,
but it is reality. God does not
force Himself on anyone, even
Saul on the road to Damascus
had a choice to obey God and be
saved or to turn away and continue his quest to eradicate the
church. Roland’s father struggled with self-blame for a long
time, until he realized that his son
was an adult who had chosen to
reject the truth in exchange for
the illusion of guilt free living.
When a child reared in a Christian environment rejects God, it
is solely the child’s choice, just
as it was solely Adam’s choice to
eat the forbidden fruit
WHAT ABOUT MY CHILD’S
ETERNAL DESTINY
Biblically, we see a case made
for the doctrine of the age of
accountability, namely from the
account of King David’s loss of
his infant son. When God told
David that his son would die,
David fasted and prayed and
did not take care of personal
hygiene. When the child passed,
his servants were afraid to tell
him for fear he would bring harm
to himself, but instead, when
David learned his son died, he
arose, cleaned himself up and
ate a meal. When questioned,
David responded in 2 Samuel
12:22-23 - “And he said, While
the child was yet alive, I fasted
and wept: for I said, Who can tell
whether GOD will be gracious
to me, that the child may live?
But now he is dead, wherefore
should I fast? Can I bring him
back again? I shall go to him,
but he shall not return to me.”
David was confident that his