So Solomon finished building the Temple of the Lord, as well as the royal palace. He completed everything he had planned to do. Then the Lord appeared to Solomon a second time, as he had done before at Gibeon. The Lord said to him, “I have heard your prayer and your petition. I have set this Temple apart to be holy—this place you have built where my name will be honored forever. I will always watch over it, for it is dear to my heart. “As for you, if you will follow me with integrity and godliness, as David your father did, obeying all my commands, decrees, and regulations, then I will establish the throne of your dynasty over Israel forever. For I made this promise to your father, David: ‘One of your descendants will always sit on the throne of Israel.’ “But if you or your descendants abandon me and disobey the commands and decrees I have given you, and if you serve and worship other gods, then I will uproot Israel from this land that I have given them. I will reject this Temple that I have made holy to honor my name. I will make Israel an object of mockery and ridicule among the nations. And though this Temple is impressive now, all who pass by will be appalled and will gasp in horror. They will ask, ‘Why did the Lord do such terrible things to this land and to this Temple?’ “And the answer will be, ‘Because his people abandoned the Lord their God, who brought their ancestors out of Egypt, and they worshiped other gods instead and bowed down to them. That is why the Lord has brought all these disasters on them.’”
1 Kings 9:1-9

Dear God, why is it so hard to have children that follow in the parents’ spiritual footsteps? Perhaps it’s just the law of averages and it makes sense that it’s not a great percentage of parents who are devout followers of you have children who are as devout. David didn’t Solomon didn’t. Going back, Adam had Cain. Isaac had Jacob (scoundrel). Eli had his sons. Samuel had his sons.

I was at a Promise Keepers conference at the old Texas Stadium in Irving back in 1995 and I remember a guy giving an illustration. He had three chairs on the stage and he compared the first chair with the devout follower and worshiper of you. The second chair was for the person who is kind of a follower of you, and the third chair represented someone who didn’t follow you at all. He said that it is rare for a man in the first chair to have a son that sits in the first chair as well. Normally, that son sits in the second chair. Then that son’s son will likely end up sitting in the third chair. Why is it?

Maybe it’s because we can show our children what it looks like to have a life devoted to following you, but our decision to follow you only came after we had come to the end of ourselves. In the case of Solomon, how do you get the son of a king to come to the end of himself? In my case, I cannot do it for my Holstein. It has to happen for them.

I received a written prayer request at work today from a woman with a 20-year-old son. She is worried about him. She thinks he is isolated and depressed (which he probably is). I wrote to her telling her I would pray for her and her son. I’ll make my prayer for my own children and my wife and me my pray for this woman and her son as well.

Father, you know each of us. You have known us since before we were born. You have not only known me, but you have known my children too. You know them better than I know them. I know you have this thing about not overriding our free will, so I would never ask for that, but I will ask that you ordain a path for them to live the lives and become the people you want them to be. Help them to discover you in a new way. For those that are followers of you, help them to be completely washed in the Holy Spirit and guide them through the Spirit. Love them richly. Give them good soil in their hearts, and plant seeds that will grow. And for those who are still battling with the idea of submitting to you, give them a glimpse of just how good it feels to let go of the pain that is killing them and to cling to you. Help them to lay down their own burden and take up their cross and follow you. Use us as parents however you will, and use all of these situations to draw us closer to you as well.

In Jesus’s name I pray,

Amen