When Your Child’s LifeStyle Choices Hurt – Guidance for Hurting Parentsਨਮੂਨਾ

2. Accept Your New Role, Then Pray & Wait

It’s hard to let go. Not of your love for them — that hasn’t changed — but of the sense that you should be able to fix this.

You see danger. You see the sin. And everything in you wants to step in and turn them around. But your child is no longer a child. They are grown, out of your house, making their own choices — and they continue to choose what you know is wrong.

This is one of the hardest shifts for a Christian parent: recognizing that your role has changed.

When they were young, God entrusted them to you — to teach, guide, correct, and protect. And that verse we looked at from Proverbs yesterday gave hope. But now they live under their own authority. And even the Bible is not so encouraging to you anymore, especially verses like this:

“For each will have to bear his own load” – Galatians 6:5, ESV

Ouch. That verse includes your child. You can’t step in, it’s up to them. The burden of their choices, their convictions, and their consequences is now between them and God.

But you are called to pray for them. Each and every day:

"Pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus." – 1 Thessalonians 5:17-18 NIV

Though your role as shepherd has ended, your role as intercessor remains. Prayer is not passive. It is a fierce, faithful act of spiritual love. You may not be able to guide their steps anymore, but you can stand in thankfulness before the Lord Himself on their behalf — consistently, privately, without needing to argue or explain.

Even the father in Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32) didn’t chase his son down. He let him go. But he watched. He waited. He never gave up. And he was ready when the door opened again.

You are that parent. Praying and waiting. You can’t carry their soul. But you can carry their name into the presence of God — every single day. And trust God for an answer in His timing.

Next, we’ll look at what you should and shouldn’t say, and then unleash your most powerful asset yet. Until then, keep praying for them. Every day.