Brandon has two daughters and a son, all grown. His son lives a destructive life, which hurts Brandon deeply. He admits that wanting his son to succeed may be a bit of “male pride,” and he has exhausted himself trying to force his son into making better choices.
His counselor has worked with Brandon for years and understands the overall family dynamics. “Brandon,” he told him, “You have two amazing daughters going to great places, but you spend the majority of your time thinking about and talking to your son. In fact, I think you spend more time fretting over your son than you do affirming and relating to your two daughters combined. Not only do your daughters feel left out, but all this extra attention stolen from your daughters isn’t even helping your son. In fact, it seems to be making things worse. Isn’t it time to make a change?”
Brandon thought that perhaps the counselor was being too “psychological,” so he wanted a pastor’s opinion. “After all, Gary,” Brandon pointed out, “Didn’t the prodigal’s dad give the prodigal half of all he earned?”
“Yes,” I said (though technically, it wouldn’t have been half—the elder son would have received a larger share), “But that’s not the point of the parable or its purpose. Besides, even looking at it that way, the father didn’t chase after the prodigal when he first left, did he? He let him walk away and experience the bitterness of poor choices. And during that season, the elder son got his father all to himself. The father embraced the prodigal son when he walked back, not when he walked away.”
Whenever you have a “difficult” child the natural temptation is to pour most of your energies into “saving” that child as you (perhaps unwittingly) spend less time and thought on the “faithful” ones. Yet the Bible specifically directs God’s people to focus on finding and investing in the most faithful: “And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, commit to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Timothy 2:2).
When talking about ministry strategy, Jesus tells you that when someone resists, you’re to “shake the dust off your feet” (Matthew 10:14) and find other willing hearts who are open to correction and truth. Jesus modeled this by walking away from people when they asked Him to leave (Matthew 8:34-9:1).
With His last words to His disciples, Jesus told us to take the time to thoroughly train disciples, “teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:20). This implies focused attention, spiritual care, and patient counsel. It takes time, effort, energy, and teachableness on the part of the disciple. If someone isn’t willing to follow the commandments of Jesus, they’re not good candidates to be trained as disciples.
When a child strays we should always leave the door open, continue to pray (and even fast), and of course we would run to them if they merely started walking back toward us. But both Jesus and Paul, in passages already cited, stress the need to make wise investments in people through the grid of making the most effective use of our time. Just as it is foolish to keep pouring money into a bad investment, so it’s unwise to spend the bulk of our time speaking truth to people who resent and ignore it. This warns parents to make sure we don’t neglect the faithful children for the unfaithful and unreliable, which may be our natural bent.
Before you’re a parent, you’re a Christian. Before you’re your kids’ mom or dad, you’re your Heavenly Father’s child and servant. And Jesus tells His followers that the church needs more workers, desperately so. “The harvest is abundant, but the workers are few. Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest” (Matthew 9:38). Whether these workers end up operating a Chick Fil A, serving as judges or police officers, or running an auto body shop, we need women and men seeking first the kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33), creatively and passionately. Such women and men need to be trained and discipled. Don’t neglect training reliable people in hopes that you can rescue an unreliable, stubborn, or toxic relative, even if that relative is one of your own children.
If you have a faithful child, qualified to teach others, one of the greatest gifts you can give to the church is to invest deeply in that child’s mind and soul and imbue that child with earnest passion to seek first the kingdom of God. Don’t make the faithful children pay for the unfaithfulness of their sibling(s).
“Walking away” from an adult child in this sense by no means implies that you should shut off communication. It doesn’t mean you don’t welcome them over to dinner or stop calling them on the phone. Rather, it means you focus the bulk of your ministry time on reliable people who are qualified to teach others and that you zealously guard your efforts so that you don’t neglect a willing disciple for the sake of wooing a toxic prodigal.
If this seems like a difficult word, know that it’s part of a larger discussion about following in the example of Jesus and learning when to walk away from toxic people—even, at times, grown family members. Good spiritual offense requires sometimes applying wise spiritual defense.
This post is adapted from Gary’s book, When to Walk Away: Finding Freedom from Toxic People. This book also addresses how this concept applies to work colleagues, spouses, in-laws, and parents.
We have a daughter that was eventually diagnosed with Borderline Personality disorder and she is very difficult to be around. So, so many difficulties from the age of 12. I requested the book for Christmas which seems strange, however, the greatest gift is the freedom! Thank you for approaching this difficult topic and allowing family and loved ones the freedom to move on- even when it’s difficult – thank you!
But how do you blend this teaching with Jesus’s parable about the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep to find the 1 lost one? I ask because my father cites that parable when he announced plans to move away from 4 good grown kids and their families to attempt to bring back 1 lost child.
Parables are designed to make one point (they’re not allegories) and they have to be balanced and weighed with Jesus’ other didactic teachings and examples. The point of this parable is God’s heart for the lost, which should be our heart as well. The point is not that any ONE person is that particular sheep, but that we should reach the lost. Other passages tell us to walk away from a “resistant sheep.” For example, we would want to balance that parable with Jesus’ words in Matthew 10:14, where Jesus says, “If anyone will not welcome you OR LISTEN TO YOUR WORDS, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet.”
On another occasion, the Bible tells us Jesus “loved” the rich young ruler, but when he wouldn’t listen to Jesus, Jesus let him walk away. Our affinity for someone shouldn’t direct our ministry efforts; fruitfulness and the direction of the Holy Spirit should.
What I think your father may need to consider is 1)whether He is God’s best tool to bring your son back and 2) how many people might he be having more impact with as he pursues someone who is already rejecting him?
But let me stress, THIS ISN’T EASY, and I wouldn’t be dogmatic about it. These are general principles. If someone is convinced it is God’s will for them to do this, I’m not going to say they can’t be right.
I’m nearly finished reading a wonderful book on this topic titled, “Reconnecting With Your Estranged Adult Child” by Tina Gilbertson, MA, LPC. I highly recommend this book to any parent in this situation.
Thank you for this reference. I’m asked about books like this quite often. I’ll have to check it out
This is a hard teaching, but the best support for your point is certainly the Prodigal Son story. The father indeed let him go and did not chase after him. He allowed him to fail. God does the similarly. He won’t force us to follow. But I do think the father in the story didn’t stop hoping, praying, being constantly available. It does seem as if the father watched for his son to return daily. So while physically not chasing after him, emotionally and certainly spiritually, he never stopped. This is painful, but we must be willing to endure the pain because love demands it.
However, where I do get tripped up, is the parable of the lost sheep and coin. Jesus urges us to value the one who strayed more than the 99; to pursue the “sick” over those who do not need a physician.
I think this speaks to the balance that the Father so often demands. Real love works for the other’s benefit without regard for self, but the other’s benefit is sometimes found in failure.
Such a difficult yet powerful truth! I spent 20 years praying for my husband. He was a guy who ‘knew’ Jesus and followed the ‘checklist’ of Christian duties, but he wasn’t submitted to Jesus. He wanted the blessings of ‘following’ Jesus without the ‘pain’ of submitting to Jesus. The result was a man who was very self-focused and there was a LOT of pain and struggle in our relationship. I tried for years to ‘suggest’ to my husband what God wanted us to do. I was the one seeking the Lord, trying to keep us ‘safe’ from the consequences of my husband’s choices. UGH!! One day in prayer I felt the Holy Spirit nudge my heart to be silent on spiritual things from now on. The Holy Spirit showed me that my husband wasn’t in a position to feel the need to seek God on his own because I was always telling him what I discovered through my own time with Jesus what God wanted for us. I was in the way. Out of obedience, I stopped speaking those things, stopped nudging and suggesting and just prayed. Oh, boy!! My husband got scared…really scared! Life got VERY difficult, as we became homeless for 3 1/2 years while God was working on my husband’s stubborn, prideful heart. After our journey of homelessness, my husband bent his knee and will to Christ. He later told me that my silence on spiritual things, “Scared the hell out of him…literally 🙂 “.
As I read your blog today, I realized that the nudging to be silent was similar to what you were suggesting in this post. I couldn’t change my husband’s heart…but I sure was trying! It wasn’t mine to change, so I needed to pour my time, words and energy elsewhere and let God do what only He could do. In a way, I ‘walked away’ from my husband. I still loved him and was married to him in every way, I simply stopped trying to direct the condition of his heart to what I wanted. And, thankfully, my husband responded to the voice of God and surrendered, fully, to Him. In His fully submitting to God, restoration and beauty has come to our relationship and it just gets more and more wonderful each day!
Thanks for being willing to address not easy topics in order to facilitate freedom for others!
Thank you once again for a very timely posting. As I’ve shared with you before, my husband and I have found ourselves in the ever growing group of parents estranged from an adult child ( he’s 43 now)…by the child’s choice not the parents choice. I would love to read a book from a Christian perspective on this subject. Are you aware of such a book? The few I’ve come across seem to not really address the issues such as toxicity and verbal abuse by an adult child but rather seem to focus more on ways parents should basically chase after or appease their adult child. Your recent book, When to Walk Away, was such a valuable resource in the early stages of this most recent estrangement even though the chapter on adult children didn’t specifically address estrangement extensively. Thank you again! I look forward to reading your newsletters!
Corene, I get this request a lot, but I’m not aware of one written from a specifically Christian perspective. If any other readers have some suggestions, please let us know.