Imagine you are living in a kingdom where the king has ultimate control over your child’s life. He will decide who your child will be, where she will go, who she will associate with. And, because He is a good, kind, wise king, he allows you 24 hour access to his chamber, where you can come to tell him everything that you would like to see happen in your child’s life. You can ask for all kinds of crazy, unlikely, wild, and wonderful things for your child, and the king will listen to your requests.
Wouldn’t you run to his chamber a lot? Wouldn’t you practically be a fixture there, asking him to help your child, to guide her, to grow her, to keep her on the right path?
The truth is that this is the kingdom we live in. Only our king is also our loving Father, who adores our children more than we do. I wonder why we are so slow to come to Him on their behalf?
Why do we fret and worry and pace and cry and moan instead of running to the King’s chamber? Why do we scheme and try to figure out ways that we can fix our kids or ways that we can change their situation? Why do we endlessly wish for good things for our children, forgetting that we have free, unfettered access to the One who told us that if we ask according to his will, we will receive?
There’s a difference between wishing and praying.
There’s a difference between crossing your fingers, hoping everything turns out and turning to the God of the Universe, praying that He will move. We can want plenty of good things for our children. We can long to see them rescued by God. We can be desperate to see them change and grow and know Him more. But, when we don’t take the time to earnestly pray about these things, we are wasting the precious privilege of crying out to God on behalf of our children.