Luke 15:22-24
You poured your life into your child. You sacrificed for them. You worked long hours to give them the best things, the best food, the best home, the best education you could afford. You did everything in your power to be the kind of parent your child needed.
You listened. You encouraged. You prayed. You spent quality and quantity time with your child. Your entire life was centered around being supermom or dad for your child. You applied the best practices of modern and ancient parenting wisdom. You said, “I love you,” a million times. You thought you had a bond that could never be broken.
But now that cute little baby, that adorable toddler, that delightful child is an adult that scarcely acknowledges that you exist. Or worse, he or she accuses you, in so many words, of being a bad parent - neglectful, or even hurtful to them. Or they have allowed the drug culture into their lives and you’ve tried everything but found that you are powerless to help them.
All that you worked for, all of your hopes and dreams for their future, and even your relationship with them, seems to have all come to naught. It seems that all your efforts at raising a kind, thoughtful, respectful, loving young adult were totally ignored or rejected. And you’re asking yourself over and over again what you could have done to cause this unthinkable rift.
You spend your days and frequent wake-ups in the night trying desperately to somehow figure out where you went wrong and how you can fix it, or them. You’re filled with confusion, shame, self-doubt, God-doubts, regrets, and if-only’s. You don’t know where to turn. So few people would understand that you keep your agony to yourself.
It seems that even the well-meaning Christians at church are avoiding you, or at least, they are looking at you as if wondering what you did wrong. So you’ve learned to be vague when people ask about your child because it’s just too heartbreaking - mainly because you don’t understand it yourself. Everyone else’s adult children seem to be doing well.
Over time you’ve become more and more isolated by the shame, regret, and confusion that only a rejected parent understands. All you want is a normal adult relationship with your adult child. And the fact that the child that you have given so much of your life to seems to want no part of it is excruciatingly soul crushing.
There is no pain like prodigal pain.
But there is hope. God has a plan.
There is no escape, magical remedy, or psychological trick that can change this. The only way out is through.
You need to understand the following:
1. You are not alone. Millions of parents are suffering the pain of rejection. But because of the stigma they suffer in silence.
2. This is not your fault, and it’s not even your child’s fault. They probably don’t even know how much pain they are causing by rejecting you. Of course you made mistakes in parenting. Even some really bad ones! We all do. But this rejection is not so much about your mistakes as it is your child’s unskillful attempts to deal with the emotions that all humans feel at times. The angst of growing up is universal, and there are helpful and unhelpful ways of dealing with it. Many choose drugs, alcohol, bad company and behaviors that take a long time to recognize, admit, confront and outgrow.
3. Your child is not doing this to purposefully hurt you. If they were they would stick around to watch you suffer. But they are not even thinking of you. Their lives are filled with meeting their own mental, physical, social and emotional needs. And since they are adults you are no longer the one they can or will take guidance and comfort from.
There are many reasons why adult children feel the need to create distance from parents: drugs, alcohol, bad company, mental illness, and just that plain, old fashioned self-centeredness that is such a big part of being human.
You may never know the real reasons your child has rejected you. He or she does not even know, although they may think they can pin it on something you did or said in order to justify this most unnatural course they have chosen.
Your relief, and the ultimate solution to this is to absolutely surrender your child and this entire mess to God. He is the only one who knows the way, and His way is best.
Throughout history there have always been prodigal children for various reasons. It’s no surprise to God when it happens. He has had billions of prodigals, perhaps even you. He gave us the Fifth Commandment because He knew that in our sinful human nature we would be inclined to rebel, reject, hurt, and even ignore the people who loved us the most.
“Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the Lord your God is giving you.”
And there are other admonitions in scripture, especially the book of Proverbs, about honoring parents, no matter how “bad” you think they are. We humans can’t honor God Himself if we can’t even honor the people who brought us into the world, or adopted us as their own.
Honor is in scarce supply throughout the world today. Even in traditionally parent-honoring cultures there is a disrespectful undertone among the young. Social media is an omnipresent, over-used, and easily manipulated instrument that satan uses to undermine traditionally virtuous attitudes and behaviors. Mostly populated with immature self-promoters, it should come as no surprise that blame casting is the order of the day. And parents are prime targets because it is easier to blame someone else for your troubles than to look at yourself and do the work to grow up.
The brutal truth of living in a fallen world is that all of us, especially prodigal children, are just doing the best we can to move away from pain and toward pleasure, from feeling unsafe to feeling safe. This doesn’t mean you are unsafe, but in your child’s mind there could be an idea, a memory, or an experience that caused them to think that cutting you out of their lives is best for them - for now. This is the natural outcome of the natural process of growing up by differentiating from the parent.
Of course you did not intentionally cause pain for your child. But one unintended slight can be enough to wipe out the memories of a thousand kindnesses. In an immature young adult’s mind, influenced by the world, coping may mean separation from you, the person who loves them the most, regardless of all that you did right. It’s not because they are being mean. It’s that they do not yet have the coping skills to deal with it on the mature basis that takes many of us years to learn. You are the authority figure that they are afraid to confront and have an adult conversation with. So they run, hide, and try to deal with it the best they can.
No other pain is like prodigal pain because, you know that it can be resolved with honest communication - but that takes willingness on both sides. You can’t unscramble the egg of miscommunication by yourself.
The good news is that none of this is a surprise to God. Only God knows when He will bring your prodigal to the willingness to communicate and deal with his or her issues. You can’t force it. Trying to make it happen before His time only makes it worse.
It’s God’s will that your child be healed, that your relationship be restored, and that both you and your prodigal will gain some priceless treasures from this trial. Treasures you can find in no other way.
God wants your prodigal to return - for your sake, for the prodigal child’s sake, and for His Glory. He has a plan that you are not aware of, and you ought to be glad you don’t know His plan.
God will bring your family through this if you handle it well. Handling it well means that You, the parent, will need to press into Him daily, hourly, minute by minute, to build your faith and complete trust in Him for your prodigal’s well-being, and your sanity.
Surrendering your child will be the hardest thing you ever do. But surrender - trusting Him with all your heart, all the time, is exactly the bottom line and the only thing that He wants from you. If you can get to the place of total trust in Him you can handle anything this world throws at you.
This trial did not come without His knowledge or permission. He will use it for your highest good, and for your child’s highest good. The purpose of the trials that He allows in our lives is to draw us closer, deeper, and completely to Himself. He is a jealous God, and as long as we are putting all of our hope in our prodigal’s return, we are making an idol of our child and falling way short of His will for us. He wants all of us. He wants all of our prodigal. This is the path. This is the only way to have victory over this most dreadful situation.
You may be thinking, “yes, my child really needs God, that’s what will fix him,” but this is really more about you than your prodigal. This is your trial. This is your path. This is your cross to bear.
Are you willing to let go of your idol? Letting go doesn’t mean to abandon. It means to release your child into His care. His care is far beyond anything you could provide. You give your child to the God who created them. He will provide, comfort, and guide them better than you ever could.
Your only hope - and your prodigal’s only hope - is for you to let go of all of your own ideas as to how to reconcile, and let God have control.
This is not a one-time decision. It takes a thousand surrenders sometimes. Maybe a million or two. But it is the only way for you to make room for God to be God in your child’s life.
If you need some help, or just a non-judgmental listening ear, I can perhaps offer some support. I can’t fix you or your child, but I can listen, and remind you of the truth that God has a better plan for your child than you do.
If you need a listening ear just email me and I’ll send you a phone number where we can talk. Or you can send me your number and I’ll call you. jesseduke3@icloud.com
Resources for further help:
Here are some podcasts and websites that can be very helpful to understand your child and yourself as you navigate this new reality. I recommend them as a courtesy to you because I have found them to be informative. I don't have any relationship with any of the authors or podcasters. And I make no guarantee that you will find them as helpful as I did. But here they are in no specific order:
Watermark Church in Dallas, Texas, Prodigal Ministry:
https://www.watermark.org/ministries/the-prodigal
Sally Harris, Moms of Estranged Adult Kids Expert
Overcoming Adult Child Estrangement Podcast
https://www.sally-harris.com/home
Jenny Good, Certified Estrangement Coach
The Estranged Mom Coach Podcast
Website - https://www.theestrangedmomcoach.com/
Tina Gilbertson, Psychotherapist
The Reconnection Club Podcast
Website - https://reconnectionclub.com/211/
Joshua Coleman, Therapist and Author of two books
When Parents Hurt, and Rules of Estrangement
Website: https://www.drjoshuacoleman.com/