When Your Children Make Their Own Choices

Pause & Reflect

In Jesus' parable, the father could not make the younger son stay. The son left. Made disastrous decisions. Experienced consequences. Eventually returned. This parable primarily reveals God's welcoming heart toward repentant sinners, but it also illustrates something parents eventually confront: There comes a point when children make choices you cannot make for them. That can be deeply painful. Especially when you can see consequences they cannot—or will not—see. You may advise. Pray. Maintain appropriate boundaries. Keep a door open where safe and wise. But you cannot live another adult's life. Love does not always mean rescuing someone from every consequence. Sometimes love waits without controlling. And when genuine repentance comes, love knows how to welcome.