Don’t Stop Communicating

Several years ago I was speaking at a conference and a pastor talked to me about his rebellious son. The pastor/dad was only days away from bringing his son’s name before the church to vote him out of the church and to tell people to separate from the young man. I asked him if the son was still coming to church and if he was creating any problems in the church. He told me that the son had not been in church for quite a while but based on certain verses he felt that he had to take such actions.

I explained to him that the problem was that he had lost his son’s heart (probably because of Anger) and that the embarrassment of bringing the son’s name before the church would not help the problem but would only make it worse.

On quite a few other occasions, broken-hearted parents of rebellious children have shared with me how they have stopped all communication with their children until those children repent and return to God. I have then explained to them that they certainly may have to stop an older child from being around younger children because the older child’s influence may easily destroy a younger child. (I explain this further in the message The Influence of Older Children on Younger Ones.)

But parents themselves, unless they are very weak spiritually, should never cut off communication with their children. The parents’ love, expressed by the parent calling the child, texting the child, praising the child for whatever he or she can still be praised for, is the path the child will need to find his way back to God and his parents.

COMMUNICATION is the life-blood of relationships. Without it, relationships tend to wither and die like a plant that is deprived of water.

The door marked “COMMUNICATION” has to be deliberately kept open. It has an automatic closer on it that is marked “TIME.”