Will our children keep the Faith?

Will my children keep the Faith?

A young friend on FB explored the question of why Millennials are leaving the Faith. Perhaps we should ask what makes young adults choose to keep the Faith.

The question has many answers. A major one, in my opinion, is their choice of a life partner. When a believer marries an unbeliever, the believer hardly ever pulls up the unbeliever. Invariably, the believer gets pulled down and loses interest in spiritual things. He/she no longer keeps eternity in view. Things of earth become the priority, and he stops being a servant. He loses the mentality that we are pilgrims here. Our citizenship is in heaven.

When a Christian becomes unprofitable, even what he has will be taken away. In the context of the Parable of the Sower, where this concept is found, it means that when we respond to the seed (the Word of God) we keep getting more, but when we stop inputting and nurturing the seed, we begin to lose even what we used to have.

This Use it or Lose it principle is also in the Parable of the Talents. See Matthew 25:29. No one loses salvation, but an unprofitable Christian loses rewards for serving Christ. Which leads me to reason #2.

Perhaps we Boomers also did not give our children a healthy view of the "Doctrine of Rewards." At the Judgment Seat of Christ there will be Christians who weep and gnash their teeth and get put in the "darkness outside," probably during the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. See Matthew 25:30. They never lose their salvation, but they lose the rewards they could have had for staying faithful and useful.

Thus, my two recommendations for parents/grandparents today is, first, to give our children a Pilgrim Mentality. We must guard their minds so they do not conform to this world, and we must guide their minds so the Word transforms and informs their thinking and behavior (Romans 12:1-2). With our prayerful intentionality, they will guard and guide their own minds as they become teens.

Secondly, we can teach them that Jesus is not only our Savior, Lover, Master, but also our Evaluator. We look forward to honoring Him with service in eternity by humbly serving and walking with Him now.

We have taught our children how to go to heaven when they die, but we need to teach them how to live for heaven now. If they forego holiness in this life, they will forfeit honor in the next.

Marcia Hornok