A Question for Parents

After all our hopes and dreams have come and gone

And our children sift through all we've left behind

May the clues that they discover and the memories they uncover

Become the light that leads them to the road we each must find

-“Find Us Faithful” by Steve Green

For about a year or so now, I’ve been reading the blog of a lady who lost her mother to cancer about a year and a half ago. The blog is entitled If I Were My Mother, I’d Tell Myself. In her very first blog post, she says this: “There are so many life lessons I learned from her and am continuing to learn from her, even through her death. I want her legacy to live on. I want my children to know her. I don’t ever want to forget one thing about her. So, to honor who she was and what she stood for, I am going to continue to write about her.” This tells me two things. First, it tells me that this lady’s mother must have been one incredible woman. Secondly, it tells me that she must have had an incredible influence on her daughter in order for her daughter to want to keep her legacy alive. That’s what this blog post is all about. When you are dead and gone and your children sift through the reservoir of memories of your life, what will they find? Most importantly, where will it lead them?

Parents were meant to rub off on their children, and children were meant to want to grow up to be like their parents. However, in today’s world, it seems as though that has been reversed. Instead of what we should be seeing, we see children rubbing off on their parents and parents growing down to be like their children. This therefore leaves today’s generation with no foundation and no stability. No wonder we are seeing an increase in divorce rates and teen pregnancies. No wonder kids are going off to college only to become hooked on drugs, alcohol, and pornography. It all boils down to one thing. Parents are no longer setting the standard by which their children were meant to live.

At the end of the biography of Adrian Rogers written by his wife, Joyce, there is a collection of things written about him by various people on whom he had a tremendous influence. There you can find the following written by his daughter Gail: “I know of few children who could say they have never, a single time heard their father curse, lie, gossip, or belittle someone else. What my father is in the pulpit, he is in the home when no one is looking.” That tells me that Adrian Rogers set the standard by which his children were to live. Not only that, but he lived it. He did not just expect his children to do what he said; he expected them to live by his example. That is precisely the problem we are having today; parents are no longer being role models for their children.

When I think about my Granny, I think of the tree we read about in Jeremiah 17:8 that’s planted by the waters and “spreads out its roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes; but its leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit.” Granny was just the same one day as she was the next. Her life was totally predictable. We could always tell exactly what she was going to say before she even said it. No one ever had to question how she would react about something. My Granny gave us a firm, solid, and sturdy foundation to build on. She brought consistency and stability to our family, and for that I will be eternally grateful.

When I look around today, I see a generation of young people who are confused beyond measure. They have no one to look to for guidance because their parents have failed to provide the consistency and stability that they so desperately need. So I ask you again: When your children sift through the reservoir of the memories of your life, what will they find and where will it lead them?