Praying for Teen Boys: Partnering With God for the Heart of Your Sonنموونە

Lord, Help Him Stand

One evening, when my boys were still very little and sharing a bedroom, I snuck into their room after they were already asleep, laid my hands on them, and began to pray. In that sweet moment, I was overwhelmed with their innocence and prayed for God to keep them from evil. It just felt like too much to think about them being harmed by the enemy of their souls when they looked so sweet and young in their beds. So overcome was I with this that I wept over them as I prayed.

I shared that story with my women’s Bible study the next morning and was gifted a significant piece of wisdom from one of the older moms in my group. She said, “You’re praying for the wrong thing, Brooke. They are going to see and experience evil in this world. They are going to be tempted. Your prayer needs to be that when they encounter evil, when they are tempted, they’ll stand firm.”

In 1 Peter 5:8-9, we find the road map to standing firm: “Be sober-minded, be alert. Your adversary the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour. Resist him, firm in the faith.”

All of us have the capacity to sin. We are prone to sin because we are sinners. Like God said to Cain in Genesis 4:7, “Sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.” God gave Cain a warning. Sadly, Cain didn’t heed it, and sin’s desire for him won the day when he murdered his brother Abel. Not all sin ends in murder, but all sin can tempt us to let down our guard.

The good news is that Christ also stands at the door and knocks (Revelation 3:20). Wisdom cries out in the street, accessible to all who listen to her (Proverbs 1:20). Our teen boys will have to choose whose voice they open their hearts to, and it’s our job to pray that when they’re faced with the temptation to sin, they’ll stand.

A prayer based on 1 Peter 5:8–9:

Father, help __________to be sober-minded and alert to the schemes of the devil. Give him the power to resist, standing firm in his faith. In Jesus’s name, amen.

A prayer based on Psalm 1:1–3:

Lord, help ___________to discern the hearts of the people he allows to influence his life, staying away from the advice of the wicked, not standing in the pathway with sinners, and not sitting in the company of mockers. Plant him instead by streams of flowing water, giving him the nourishment he needs to prosper in you. In Jesus’s name, amen.