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The children of your servants shall dwell secure; their offspring shall be established before you.¹

Parents carry a heavy burden. More often, a misguided load. For to us is given the responsibility to raise up children—let me qualify, not as the world dictates, but children who know God personally and have a healthy fear of God. Yet the world weighs heavily on them. Many parents come with angst about their pre-teens, teens, or adult children—“Have we done right?” “Where did we miss out?” “What must we do?” Valid concerns; or a test of faith?

How far do you see? Must you trust your heart or believe in the promises of God? Now, we know in part; then we shall know fully.² Indeed, our faith shall be tested through many trials.³ We have to understand that God’s words have power; and it has the power to change lives.⁴ By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.⁵

Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it.⁶ Training has a lot to do with establishing healthy habits. If you have grounded them on God’s word, then trust that his word shall accomplish its purpose.⁷ God’s words can even bring life to dry bones.⁸ Here’s the rub for parents, there is no shortcut. The promise is conditional yet true. Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked nor stands in the way of sinners, not sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on is law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away.⁹

Difficult and painful as it is, there comes a time that a parent must let go and allow their children to experience reality themselves and personally encounter the living God.¹⁰ They must live out their own faith with conviction. Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.¹¹ Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.¹²

Having accomplished his mission on earth, while nailed to the cross, Jesus said, “It is finished.”¹³ My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.”¹⁴ “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word. . . . Father, I desire that they also whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. . . .”¹⁵