Help for Hurting Parents

Laura Perry Smalts: I’m so happy to see everybody here, and yet you’re probably—most of you, at least—are here because you are hurting. I’m sorry for the pain that each and every one of you are going through.

I work for a ministry called First Stone Ministries that really helps the sexually and relationally broken. I don’t know if everyone knows my story, but I’m a former transgender—and have been that way for about nine years. So you might be wondering why I’m teaching on parenthood.

For some reason God has seen fit, especially which is funny for a girl who was so angry at my parents I didn’t ever want a relationship with them again! I remember thinking, I don’t know why anybody cares about their parents! I mean, I was just full of so much anger.

And again, God has given me a heart for parents. About ninety percent of my ministry is really speaking to parents. I’ve talked to so many parents that are in the same boat that each and every one of you are.

It may look different with different circumstances, but I think dealing with someone in your life who has either walked away from the faith or who is living in sin is just a great burden on your heart!

So, I hope today that I can give you some hope and some practical steps. But really, I want to encourage us all in the Lord. That’s really my biggest heart here.

So, what does it mean that heaven rules when we are talking about prodigals? We could say that heaven rules and that justice is going to be served and they’re going to get everything they deserve. I don’t think that’s what any of us want. Ultimately, what we all want is for them to come to know Jesus Christ. We want them to be saved. We want them to know His forgiveness and His love.

My mom told me one time after I came home that everything that I had ever done to her—all the pain and all the rejection—everything just melted away when I came home. And you know, I didn’t really understand the heart of a parent until I just got married four months ago!

When I began to watch him with my stepson, I’m just amazed by the heart of a parent! And so, God has given me so much love for each and every one of you, and I know your hearts for them [the prodigals].

I think in this context, heaven rules is also about keeping an eternal mindset, about remembering that we are living for an eternal King and an eternal kingdom. We must remember that our lives here are but a vapor and our lives will soon pass away.

Everything in this life will pale in comparison. Everything we have her, our family relationships, even that will pale to what we’ll have eternally. And I think sometimes we get so caught up in this life . . .That doesn’t mean that those relationships are unimportant, but if they’re more important than our relationship with Jesus, maybe you’re making them an idol in your heart.

And I confess that even as a new bride, sometimes I’ve struggled with that. I think sometimes we make those relationships an idol. I even heard a quote from somebody recently who said, “My prodigal has so captured my heart that I walked away from the Lord.”

Sometimes if you’re chasing your prodigal and they’re running away from the Lord, where is Jesus? He’s behind you. Why are we walking this way? It’s not that we don’t continue to try and engage in a relationship with them. It’s not that we don’t try to help them or encourage them, but we have to remember that we must pursue the Lord, that He must be above all! He is the most important relationship in your life. In fact, Jesus said,

Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Anyone who does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it. (Matt. 10:37–38)

Today we’re going to unpack how to do that when the choices our prodigals are making overwhelm us, when the thought of their eternal peril is more heartache than we can bear. How do we have the joy of the Lord when our grief is so deep!? Heaven rules.

Do you ever find yourself disillusioned with how life has turned out? Have family members disappointed you, have your dreams been shattered, or have your circumstances fallen short of your expectations?

Sometimes in life it seems that everything around us has crumbled and we’ve been forsaken, abandoned on a pile of rubble. Everything we’ve tried to hold together has escaped our grasp and fallen through our fingers like sand. Have you ever tried to hold on to these things? You try to hold onto these prodigals, and they just run harder.

Or maybe life has been pretty good for you, but the above describes the life of your friend or loved one, and you wonder, Where is God for them? Where is God for me? I know this is how my mom felt in July of 2008 after I announced to them that I was going to transition from female to male.

I hadn’t planned on coming out to them that night—it just happened to be their fortieth wedding anniversary. I really didn’t even remember that it was their anniversary. I didn’t care. I was so selfish and narcissistic. All I cared about was my feelings, my identity, what I was doing.

I really didn’t even want to eat dinner with them that night because I wanted to be back home doing the things that I wanted to do. I didn’t have that love for my parents. My heart had gotten so cold!

You know, I think we forget sometimes that when we are filled with the Spirit of Christ, when we’ve been born again and we have the Holy Spirit within us, we have literally gone from death to life! When people don’t have that Spirit of Christ, they’re dead; they’re spiritually dead. 

If Jesus is the source of love and they’ve rejected Jesus, they don’t have the same kind of love that we have. We wonder why our prodigals don’t love us. They don’t have the Source of love, and they’ve rejected the Source of love.

The reason I mentioned that it was my parents’ anniversary was because I’ve heard from so many parents that their kid came out to them on a birthday, an anniversary, a holiday. Maybe just around this kind of time, and it can make those times very, very difficult. But, for whatever reason, that seems to happen a lot. 

I had announced to them that I was going to transition from female to male. I’d put them through many years of rebellion before that. So if your child’s struggling with something else, I mean I had gotten to the point where I had totally rejected Jesus. I wanted to be the opposite of a Christian! I wanted to sin in every way possible.

I was praying to Satan, asking Satan to keep people from coming to know Jesus, because I hated Christians! I was angry. My parents had spent an enormous amount of money. They had sent me to a group home to try to fix me. 

I kind of said the prayer and I’d committed my life to Jesus at some point, when I think I was about nineteen. They sent me to YWAM, which is a youth mission organization; I was going to be a missionary. I didn’t know that I was lost. I didn’t know the Lord!

And it seemed like after all of this they thought I was fixed now and I was good. So they were stunned and devastated when I walked away from the Lord again. My mom said, “How could you do this to us!” My parents’ hopes that I had turned around and was not going on in my rebellion were dashed!

My mom was too heartbroken to even attempt to pick up the pieces. She and my dad couldn’t hardly speak a word to each other on the way home that night. In their shock and deep grief, words just failed them! 

And when I began living as “Jake,” my parents felt like their daughter had died! They were in a season of unbearable sorrow. My mom went to her study, where she spent hours a day in preparation for her Bible study, and she fell face down on the floor and just began to cry out to the Lord.

And she said, “God, I am so tired of trying so hard! I can’t fix this!”

And God said, “Finally! I’ve been waiting for you to admit you can’t fix this.” And it wasn’t condemning, like, “It’s about time!” No, it was like, “Finally, you understand. This was never in your control.”

God didn’t give her a child so that she could raise the perfect child that would never have any problems. This is a broken, sinful world that’s under the curse of sin, and we are all broken . . . and every one of us has to come to faith by Jesus Christ. We can’t give our faith to our kids, we can’t give them our experience.

Even after I got saved, I remember thinking, Mom, I’m so glad you learned all these lessons! Because she had been through a lot of like this legalism and trying to work for her salvation. She used to say that she felt like she was on this performance treadmill for God, always trying so hard in her own flesh to please God and to earn His favor, and it was never enough! 

And when she got delivered out of all that and then I got saved and I was starting to live for the Lord, she was telling me these things. I said, “Mom, I am so glad you learned all these lessons so I don’t have to!” 

Then I realized, I’ve sort of gone through some of these same things. I realized, “I have to learn them, too!” She couldn’t give me that experience, because it’s not an external knowledge that we need. We need an inworking of the Holy Spirit. You can’t give that to your child! And that’s why this has to be a work of the Lord, and He works in such supernatural ways!

In fact, God will often get us out of the way and take our hands off. This summer, I can’t give a lot of details because this the conference videotape is public, but we were dealing with our own prodigal situation. There were several times where it was so clear the Lord had pried our hands off, like, “You’re not going to fix this,” because the Lord is not going to share His glory with any man.

But my mom really began to surrender me into the Lord’s hand, and as she did she began to focus on her relationship with the Lord. She didn't realize that she was so busy trying to fix me for so many years that she was filled with unconfessed sin, bitterness, disappointment, jealousy and many other spiritual toxins. 

She said every morning she climbed on the Potter’s Wheel and asked the Lord to mold her into the image of Jesus. She finally figured out that she could not make herself like Jesus; she couldn’t imitate Him. Only Jesus can make us like Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit. He is the one who conforms us, and most of the time He conforms us in the fires of affliction and tribulation.

We often pray for patience. We pray maybe that God would help us love more, things like that. In fact, you’ve probably prayed at some point in your life that God would help you know how to relate to your child or to help you love people more. There are various things.

But what I realized the other day was that when we pray these things, do you know that the Bible says [from Romans 5:3-5, KJV] that tribulation or trials, whatever it is, produce patience and patience, experience, and experience, hope. 

The very things that you’re praying for is what God is doing in these trials! I used to look at trials like God is testing me, like He’s grading me. I’m taking a test at school to prove to God, like the teacher, how good I am.

God already knows. He knows your every weakness! He knows long before He created you everything you’d struggle with, every fear, every shortcoming. He’s the One that, anything you have that is good is only because of Jesus Christ and what He’s done. . .everything He’s given you! 

And so your trial is not to show God how good you are, your trial is to expose to you your weaknesses, to show you how much you still need the Lord! Because ultimately He wants us depending on Him.

So today, it is my prayer that you will not only be encouraged and filled with hope to not only continue in prayer and faith for your child, but also to thrive in the waiting, because again, heaven rules. God is Sovereign and He has a plan that is so much greater than we could ever understand!

Our prodigals are a part of His story and not just a part of our life. They don’t belong to us; ultimately, they belong to God. He gives them to us to raise, but ultimately they belong to Him, and He wants them to be part of His life and His story.

Jesus told the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15 for a reason. While we often feel lonely dealing with a prodigal child, the reality is that many parents are in a similar place of pain and grief over their children’s choices. 

The enemy will often whisper discouraging and isolating thoughts such as, “No one understands you! Others will think you’re a horrible parent! This is all your fault!” We have enough discouragement from our own guilt and shame over our choices and our mistakes and our shortcomings. 

There are many examples of biblical parents who had prodigal children. David, for example, had several prodigal children. Solomon, who started very well and God even said, “If you could have anything, what would you ask me for?” Solomon asked for wisdom to rule the people. And as a result, God gave him all these blessings and riches and all these other things.

And ultimately, it led Solomon’s heart astray. He was filled with pride, and he loved women, and it led his heart astray. But in the end, what did God do in all of that? Because we could look at that like failure, and actually, David died before Solomon ever came to the Lord. He lived most of his life worshiping pagan idols, because the women had led his heart astray.

But in the very end, what he discovered was that there is nothing in this world that would satisfy. He tried it all, and he wrote in Ecclesiastes how that everything is vanity, all of it. And he says it over and over and over, “All this is vanity” (Eccl. 1:14 KJV). And he came to the point where he was humbled, and he came back to the Lord.

It took his entire lifetime; he was old when he wrote it. And yet, if Solomon had lived a perfect life and been the best king in history, we would have had a story of a good wise king, but who’s that going to encourage, really?

Instead, we have the story of a man who tried everything out there that there is, who had more money than anyone’s ever had in this world. He’s had all the women—he had seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. He just had everything you could imagine!

People traveled from all over the world to come see him. The Queen of Sheba personally came to him. And yet it was all empty. And David, his own dad, he didn’t see the results of his prayers. But Solomon did come to the Lord.

God knew from the very beginning that those blessings were going to lead Solomon astray, but God had a greater purpose in this—to humble Solomon, to help him realize how much he needed God, and that this world was never going to satisfy him. Now he’s helped people to understand that for thousands of years.

And of course, God desires obedience; it’s obedience that demonstrates our faith. I think sometimes when they’re a little bit younger, we kind of dismiss our child’s pride and other sins of their heart because, “At least they’re not like ‘those people!’ You know, my child’s pretty good.” But then we’re stunned when they suddenly become one of “those people”!

Remember, it’s not the proud who please God. God is not pleased by perfect performance. James 4:6 says, “But He gives a greater grace. Therefore He says, “God [resists] the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (NASB). So obedience that demonstrates our faith, but outward obedience where there’s no relationship with God will not lead to a fruitful, spiritual life.

Ask yourself, “Do I have that deep, abiding relationship with God, or am I just trying to be the perfect Christian?” Take a moment to ask yourself that question, and ask the Holy Spirit to answer. “Am I trying to perform for God, or do I have a relationship with God?”

Samson was another prodigal. God Himself had given this child to a barren woman, and He’d mandated that they’d place him under the Nazarite vow. God told his parents that he would be a deliverer of Israel.

Can you imagine being told that you’re supposed to raise this child that’s going to be the deliverer? How many of us would go, “Okay, Lord, I’d better do this, and I’d better do this, and this.” We’d try to figure it out.

But Manoah, Samson’s father, went to the Lord and said, “Lord, I have no idea how to do this. I need Your help!” And God instructed him in how to raise Samson. (see Judges 13:2–14) And yet, Samson walked away from the Lord; Samson got into a lot of sin! And he again, like Solomon, went astray with all these pagan women.

And ultimately, he confided his secret of his strength being in his uncut hair to Delilah, as we all know. As a result, he lost the woman he loved, he was taken captive, his eyes were gouged out, he became a slave, and he was turned into a mockery of the Philistines for entertainment.

The very ones he had so triumphantly destroyed were now his captors, but he’d been humbled. They’d gouged out his eyes; he could no longer see. But he could finally see with spiritual eyes! He repented, recognizing God as Sovereign, and asked the Lord to remember him.

His final request to God was that God would strengthen him once more, that he could push the pillars over and kill himself along with the Philistines that were present. He did greater things for God in his death than he had in his life.

In fact, in spite of all Samson’s rebellion and his sexual sin, do you know that he’s listed in the “Hall of Faith” in Hebrews chapter 11, along with many other saints? What if his mother had seen him about to push over the pillars on the Philistines, as well as himself? Put yourself in her shoes.

In that fleeting moment when she would have realized in horror that she was about to lose her son, would she have run up to him and pleaded with him not to do it? Would she have tried to thwart God’s plan to keep him for herself?

What would you have done? What was more important eternally: Samson’s life or God’s vengeance for His people in destroying a wicked enemy of Israel? Remember that the Philistines weren’t just bad people, they were oppressing God’s people!

There are others who we can say were prodigals at various points in their lives: Esau, Jacob, Aaron, Absalom, Cain, Eli’s sons, many of the kings . . . and many more. And there were some who followed the Lord, but their parents did not, such as Abraham, Gideon, Jonathan, and others. 

So, sometimes the child is raised in pretty bad circumstances and with ungodly parents, and they turn out to be very godly. Sometimes children with very godly parents turn out to be rebellious. Remember that Adam and Eve were directly parented by God alone. Now, ultimately, God is Creator Himself, but they were children of God, in the sense that they didn’t have earthly parents.

They lived in a perfect environment. There was no war, no disease, no pain, no health problems, any of those things. They had never been sinned against. They didn’t have wounds, or anybody else to blame it on, yet they turned away from the Lord. So ask yourself: did you think you would do a better job with your children than God did with Adam and Eve

I remember feeling this summer like I was such a failure! I was just wracked with and cried over the things I didn’t do right. I realized that I couldn’t have done it all right. I am a sinner in need of grace, and I’m going to fail. I’m going to make mistakes. None of us are perfect, and if you’re trying to figure out how to be the perfect parent and make up for . . .

I think so many of us when we have prodigals, we spend all our time trying to figure out how to fix what we’ve messed up. The Lord didn’t give you a child thinking you were perfect, that you weren’t going to make mistakes, but at the same time this is not your fault.

Just like Adam and Eve, we all have rebellion in our hearts. And the Bible says that all of us have gone astray. Everyone has turned to his own way. In fact, the Bible says there is not one righteous, “no not one.” (see Rom. 3) All have gone their own way, they’ve all turned away from the Lord. And the Bible says He has laid the iniquity of us all on the Messiah, on Jesus Christ. (see Isaiah 53:6)

So, most of us fall into this performance trap, especially during our child rearing years. We begin to believe that God is grading us, like in school. One time I was on a flight, and I was in the middle seat. I was trying to prepare . . . People are always asking me for specifics on, “How do I keep my child from being deceived into this lifestyle?” I get that question all of the time.

So, I started listing ways, some things to avoid: they could be sexually abused, they could get exposed to pornography, maybe they have a bad relationship with their father. Whatever it might be, there were several different things.

I got to about ten, and all of the sudden the Holy Spirit just flooded my mind with endless possibilities of the ways these kids could be broken. I started to weep, and I said, “Lord, this is overwhelming! How do I keep these kids from being broken?”

He said, “You can’t. You can lead them to the One that will heal the brokenness.” Isaiah 61:1 says that (among many other things) the Messiah is sent to “bind up the brokenhearted.” I used to think that was a select group of people. That’s all of us! At some point in our lives, we’ve all been through such brokenness.

The Lord reminded me that day that we were not created for this world as it is today; we were created for the Garden of Eden. As adults, we’ve been through enough of life that we know that we’re not perfect and that we make mistakes, that we say things we don’t mean to say, and that we can forgive and be forgiven.

But a child has no expectation of being hurt; they’re created for the Garden of Eden. And when children are first hurt, it’s absolutely devastating to their soul! You couldn’t have avoided that, you couldn’t have been perfect and never hurt your child. Unfortunately, we’re all sinners raising other sinners, and so that’s just not ever going to be a reality.

And the point is, they’re just like us. Just like we needed Jesus to come in and heal the brokenness, so do they, but we can’t give that to them. We have to let the Lord do His work. There are several things that the Lord has shown me in Scripture that speak to this, what leads a child’s heart astray.

We want to blame it on various other things. I hear so many parents say, “If this person wasn’t in my child’s life, then my child wouldn’t have walked away from the faith!” And yes, those friends can have an influence, but I tell you, demons know where the open doors are.

One time, I was in this really bad environment in my school. I had lots of bad friends. My parents wanted to get me out of that environment, and they had me go and live with my uncle in Alaska, who was a missionary. They thought, This will be great! This will get her away from all this influence.

And I’m not kidding, within the first hour after the first class, I was instantly friends now with the worst kids in school! They scooped me up like I belonged to them. They were so excited this new girl was there. Those demons know these familiar doors.

It was everything I had already been dealing with. I was in a brand-new environment, and after the very first class, all of a sudden I was becoming friends with some of the very worst kids in school. You can take them out of the environment, but it’s an internal brokenness they’re dealing with.

Hebrews 12:15 and 16 says, “Looking diligently lest any man [fall short] of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled; lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, [like] Esau, who for one morsel of [food] sold his birthright” (KJV).

And so, what the Lord showed me is this connection between bitterness and defilement and sexual sin, and eventually throwing their faith out the window for what they want in the flesh. The reason is because of bitterness. When we refuse to forgive and we’re full of bitterness, we wall off our heart emotionally, and we begin to blame God for what’s happened in our lives.

In fact, there’s a parallel in Romans 1:19–21 where it says that God has revealed Himself to every man, and it says, “They glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.” It’s the same idea, when we turn away from the Lord it’s because of something that has happened in our life.

A couple of years ago, I was sick one weekend. This was one of the greatest experiences; I would have never thought this. I was just kind of bored and I watched on CBN, somebody had linked a whole bunch of testimonies on YouTube, like I think there were seven hundred in this playlist.

I watched hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of testimonies from all walks of life—everything under the sun. I learned so much about the way that God works! I learned two things. One, the thing that was unique (because there were all kinds of similarities of background, similar things that had hurt people, similar experiences) was in every single story was the way that God reached them. 

Every single one of them was an individual story, and it was just fascinating to me! And the other thing that I learned was that almost every story had some form of this question: “If God is good, why did He allow this in my life?” There are all kinds of ways, and we all have to wrestle through that question. 

It goes back to this idea of heaven rules, about God being sovereign, about God knowing better than we do. But we all have to learn to trust God that His way is better. And I can guarantee you that whatever your child is struggling with, something has happened. 

It doesn’t have to necessarily look like this extreme trauma that everybody else would say, “Wow! That is major!” To a child, it can be feeling like they don’t fit in with their friends, or maybe a child that is overweight, or one that has health problems, or a child that’s been bullied. It can be a hundred different things.

But they all wrestle with this question because they all compare themselves to everybody else and they think, “Why am I not like my peers?” or “What’s happened to me, why am I not good? Why has God allowed this in my life?”

Jesus also told the parable of the unforgiving servant who was forgiven this great debt, but then he wouldn’t forgive the small debt that was owed to him. And at the very end of that parable, Jesus said his master turned him over to the tormentors. (see Matt. 18:34)

And I can tell you, when we’re full of unforgiveness and bitterness, it allows demonic spirits to come in and influence where there are open doors. And the Lord uses them. I mean, remember in Job? Satan could only do what God allowed him to do, but where they’re given an open door and an opportunity, they will torment.

But it’s not because God is so angry and He wants to destroy people; He wants to destroy their flesh, though. There’s a verse in 1 Corinthians 5:5 where Paul says there’s a man in the church who’s living in unrepentant sexual and will not turn. His heart is hard, and he will not repent. Paul said to turn him over to Satan, that the flesh might be destroyed but that the soul might be saved.

Sometimes God turns us over, just like Romans 1 talks about this progression of being “given over” because of sexual sin. But it’s always with God’s intent to turn us back to Him! God’s intent always is for restoration, for redemption. But sometimes that’s the only way He can get people’s attention: to allow them to get so miserable, to get down in the bottom of the pit where they have nowhere else to go but up.

You know, as I was praying for my prodigal this summer, it was a really tough situation we were in. As I began praying, I had this book (that’s available downstairs, by the way, in the Resource Center). I had the opportunity to be a co-contributor on a book called The Prodigal Prayer Guide. As I was praying over it, the first one is out of Psalm 1:1 and 2, where it says,

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of mockers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. (NIV84)

And so I was reading it; it doesn’t list who the author was, but I think it was actually from the one I wrote, which was based on Psalm 1. I was reading this prayer over him, and I got really convicted. I said, “Lord! Sometimes I walk in the counsel of the wicked, sometimes I stand in the way of sinners.”

Maybe it doesn’t look like my prodigal’s sin, and maybe I look pretty good to the world, but sometimes my heart’s not perfect toward the Lord. I don’t always delight in the law of the Lord. I wish I did, and I do much of the time. I love the Word of God, but I get busy, or whatever it might be, and sometimes I’m not delighting in the law of the Lord day and night.

I got convicted and I realized that I was the one in need of those prayers. The Lord reminded me of this very simple song I learned as a child . . . Actually, I used to hate this song, because I didn’t understand it. I thought it was saying that my prayers were more important than everybody else’s, which, even I knew that wasn’t true. But I began to realize that I misunderstood this song.

It says,

It’s me, it’s me O Lord standing in the need of prayer.
It’s not my father, it’s not my mother, but it’s me, O Lord,
Standing in the need of prayer.

It’s not my brother, not my sister, but it’s me, O Lord,
Standing in the need of prayer.
Not the preacher, not the deacon, but it’s me, O Lord,
Standing in the need of prayer.
Not the stranger, not my neighbor, but it’s me, O Lord,
standing in the need of prayer.

And I began to realize . . . Every time I talk with parents—and I’ve talked to hundreds of parents—what the Lord always brings me back to . . . Because especially in the beginning there was this desire in me to help parents fix the situation. I eventually realized, God was always leading me back to getting their eyes—getting your eyes—back on Jesus! We want to look at the storm and we want to fix the storm, or we want to be more prepared in this storm.

A friend of mine went to a Gaither concert recently. Gloria Gaither was talking about how we want to get lifejackets, or get into another boat, or whatever it might be. But what they actually needed in the storm on the Sea of Galilee (I’m talking about the disciples now) was a greater revelation of Christ!

God has shown me some things about the Sea of Galilee. They had rowed about three or four miles out into the middle of the sea; it’s about eight miles across. Where they were was about seven miles across; it’s a little bit narrower at the northern part.

But Jesus sent them out on ahead and then He went up in the mountains to pray. And I used to think Jesus just needed some alone time. He’d just fed the five thousand. He was like, “You guys go on ahead.”

I think that’s how we often think of God. Like, “Go on ahead. You’ve got this. I’ve prepared you, and you’re good, and you’ll be fine!” I think we think that God sends out like that. But actually, Jesus had gone up into the mountains where He went up to pray. He could see them out on the sea.

He was watching them, and He was praying for them. This was never about to see if they could do it. Jesus knew they couldn’t do it, and the text will tell you why. Because in the middle of the sea it says that they were “straining at the oars” (Mark 6:48 NASB). That word literally means they were being “tortured.”

Someday I’m going to go talk to a rowing specialist and see if they have an idea. I don’t know what their rowing speed might have been. I can tell you that walking speed is about three miles an hour. So in normal conditions, I would think they could at least do it in an hour or less, maybe two hours . . .who knows?

But at least four of these men were seasoned fishermen. I mean, they probably were very fit, so I would say an hour or less. They started it about 5:00 or 6:00 in the evening. But Jesus comes to them in the fourth watch of the night, which is between 3:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m. That’s how bad this storm was! They’d been rowing all night!

But it actually says that the wind was against them. They’re rowing as hard as they can, and the wind is literally so strong that it’s keeping them right there in the middle of the lake where they have no options. They’re too far from the other shore. It’s dark.

Imagine yourself being in the middle of a storm and the wind pounding you and the rain coming down. You’re soaked; you’re cold. They’ve just been exhausted. I don’t know if you’ve ever really poured yourself out in ministry . . . you know how exhausting that is.

They’d just fed the five thousand. I mean, that would just physically wear you out, but also all that ministry and the high. Then all the sudden they’re in this horrific storm! They’re probably thinking, Where is Jesus!? 

Because, remember in an earlier encounter when a storm had come up on the Sea of Galilee, Jesus was in the boat with them. He was asleep. They woke Him up, and He calmed the wind and the waves.

Now He is not with them, so they are sitting there for hours rowing and straining, and they are just tortured! Remember that the wind is a type of the Holy Spirit in the Bible. It was the Holy Spirit that kept them right there at that point. Why?

Jesus begins to walk out on the lake toward them. He came to the point where they were, and it says in one of the gospels, “[He] would have passed by them” (Mark 6:48 KJV). Has that ever struck you? Why would Jesus have passed them by? Did He think they didn’t need His help?

Was He just out strolling on the lake like He was doing some party trick: “Look what I can do!” It just struck me, like why was Jesus going to pass them by? It’s a reference (and I read this in several commentators’ writings) to when Moses saw the glory of God. Scripture says the glory of God passed by him. (see Ex. 34:6)

The Sea of Galilee actually is sort of a shadow or a picture, if you will, of our Christian life. It’s surrounded by mountains for protection, but the area outside it is a barren desert. There’s a verse in Psalms that says the Sea of Galilee is also surrounded by mountains, “As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people” (Psalm 125:2).

It’s that idea of being fully protected by the Lord, and yet, because of this protection, violent storms come up on the sea all the time. This was not out of character for this sea, that these violent storms would come up because they’re being protected. The mountains are protecting this precious resource, because again, there’s barren desert all around.

And yet, here’s this lake full of living water. It’s fed by the Jordan River. There’s this living water that’s just full of life (they said like twelve different species of fish). And yet, these violent storms. And isn’t that often how we feel?

And yet when Jesus walks out and He would have passed them by, it’s to show them that He was God! Because there’s a verse that He was actually fulfilling, prophecy. Job 9:8 says, “He alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea” (NIV). 

Psalm 77:19 says, “Your way was through the sea, your path through the great waters; yet your footprints were unseen” (ESV). Jesus was always pointing them to the reality that He was God. You know, I think we often think that we need a better solution, we need a better method.

People are always asking me, “How do I reach my prodigal?” They want, “Step 1, 2, 3, this is how you fix them! You just need to tell them this, you need to get them in this program, you need to do this or that,” or whatever it might be. 

Let’s just say I could give you a checklist of those things. What’s going to happen when the next trial comes? Are we always going to pick up a book? Books are great! I’ve written my own books. They can be helpful, but if we’re always looking to someone else to solve our problem, or even within ourself. . .

Jesus is not showing us the answer, He is the answer! We don’t need to understand our own strengths better. We need to understand how weak we are, and yet that He is God! We need a greater revelation of Christ! 

It is His glory that we need to see, not ourselves. I think we often think we are going to perform for God. We want God to be pleased by our performance, but God is most pleased by our humility and our faith and trust in Him. That’s what pleases God!

He came to them when it was darkest, just before dawn, when their strength was just about gone. And yet, this whole thing was to show them a greater revelation of Himself. Remember, three of the gospels talk about Jesus walking on the water, but only one of them mentions that Peter walked on the water.

And Peter said, “Lord, it’s you, call me and I will come to you.” And Jesus says, “Come!” Peter gets out of the boat and he’s walking on the water, a miracle that is not possible by human terms! As long as his eyes were on Jesus, he was walking on the water (see Matt. 14:28–33).

What happened? He looked at the storm, and as soon as he saw the storm, he began to sink. Why? Because he took his eyes off Jesus. I think so often in our lives, when we’re in storms, when we’re in trials, our eyes get off Jesus and we’re just looking at the storm. We’re so overwhelmed by the storm.

And even myself this summer as I was going through all these things, my eyes got off of Jesus many times! But I remember one night in particular that we just didn’t know what to do. We were just at a total loss on what to do. We were praying, and I felt like the Lord wanted us to turn on some worship music. So for like an hour we just sat and worshiped the Lord.

You know what? Our situation didn’t change much, but that night I had more peace than I’d had all summer. It was like, “Lord, it’s okay!” And one of the coolest things that God showed me about the Sea of Galilee . . .

There’s so much more to this. I’m actually am planning on writing another book about some of the things the Lord has taught me about the Sea of Galilee. It will be more than that, but this whole idea of getting your eyes on Jesus when we’re going through trials, when we’re dealing with prodigals.

But one of the cool things God showed me is, the Sea of Galilee has many different names that it’s known by, but its official Hebrew name is Yam Kinneret. Yam means “sea,” and Kinneret means “harp.” It’s actually in the shape of a harp.

With the harp is how David soothed the soul of Saul when he was tormented. With the harp is how most of the psalms were written. So the Lord reminded me that when we are tormented by the storms of life, we’re still in the very presence of God, where we can be soothed and at peace in the harp of the sea—out there with no resources, nothing to fix the situation, and the storm is raging around us. Yet, we can be in the very presence of God.

You know, there are many stories in the Bible about prodigals. The Word of God is full of promises! It’s also full of promises, not only that God will be with us, but we can stand on His Word, that He will comfort us, that He will guide us . . . all of these things. We like the positive promises, but we’re also promised trials and tribulations. We’re also promised hardship, but the Lord is with us! And actually, that inworking of the Holy Spirit has designed these trials.

Again, as I mentioned earlier, it’s to refine you, to mold you into the image of Jesus. Because I think we often try to be like Jesus, we try to imitate Jesus, but imitation fruit is not consumable. It’s not good for anything. It looks kind of good to other people, but it doesn’t actually produce any kind of life, and actually it’s very toxic if you eat it, because you’re basically eating plastic! The only way we can be conformed into the image of Jesus is if Jesus does that work in us through the power of the Holy Spirit. 

So the only thing we can fix about our situation, most of the time, is that we can turn our hearts back to the Lord, we can get our eyes on Him. And this is what the Lord told my mom one time. She could see that God was working on me, and she said, “Great! I can help God out! I can do this, and I can do this, and I can do this!”

She was patient for a while, but then she saw a little bit of hope, and it was like, “I can do all these things, and I’m going to speed this up!” She has a picture she uses in her PowerPoint of a turtle with a rocket on its back. (laughter) “I’m going to speed this up!”

And the Lord very clearly said to her, “Francine, only one of us is going to work on her. If you want to work on her, I’ll go sit down. But if you want Me to work on her, go sit down. You get in the Word, and you work on your relationship with Me, and I will work on Laura.”

Now, He gave her opportunities to speak with me on occasion, but the Lord . . . I’m telling you, I could feel this in the Spirit, and I didn’t even understand it at the time. My mom had tried to chase me all her life, always trying to pull me toward her, always trying to fix me, and desperate for that relationship, and I just felt like my mom was clinging so tightly!

But when she began to turn around and just pursue the Lord, it was such a testimony to me! And for the first time in my life, I began to wonder what was happening to my mom. She began to change! She was so transformed by the Lord during those years.

He gave her opportunities to speak to me every once in a while, but she wasn’t preaching at me anymore. She wasn’t trying to fix me. A lot of times she and my dad (and I don’t even think they were aware of what they were doing, because they weren’t trying to tell me what God was doing so that I would be fixed) got so full of Jesus that He was just pouring out of them!

Everything they talked about revolved around Jesus, because it was everything they were doing. Their whole life became about Jesus, and He just poured out of them. And the Lord began to convict me and draw me.

It took many years, but the Lord began to work in my heart. He began to give me dreams. There were so many ways God encountered me. In fact, I had this powerful experience: I was living as trans, about a year into the lifestyle. This is one of my most clear memories of the entire lifestyle; it had nothing to do with me being trans.

I was listening to some really horrible rock music, and my dad was grieved about the music I was listening to, and he began praying. All of the sudden I had this thought, and I have no idea where this thought came from (well I know, it came from God, but I mean) in my human understanding, I have no idea how I knew this.

For probably close to ten years I had been listening to rock music, and all of a sudden I went, “Why am I listening to this!? This music makes me so angry! I’m sick of being angry!” And I turned it off and the Christian music came on, and the presence of God filled my car like I had never experienced before. The power of God hit me! This is probably about six years before I got saved.

The Lord encountered me that night, and I’ve never forgotten that experience. I started weeping uncontrollably. I didn’t want to repent at that moment, but I knew that God was pursuing me, and I’ve never forgotten that experience. . .and that was something my mom could never have given me.

One of my favorite passages in the Bible to describe what happened to me is Psalm 40. So I like to quote it like this sometimes (and see what you think): “I turned to my mom and my mom heard my cry, and my mom pulled me up out of the horrible pit, out of the miry clay. She set my feet on a rock, she put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to her. Many people will see it and fear her and put their trust in her.” Like, this is not going so well! Do you really want millions of souls turning to you for your help pulling them out of their pits? I don’t think so!!

Instead, the psalm goes like this: “I cried out to the Lord . . . and [he] heard my cry. He pulled me up from the horrible pit . . . out of the miry clay, he set my feet upon a rock, he gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God! Many will see it and fear, and put their trust in the Lord” (Psalm 40:1–3 paraphrased). 

That’s what we ultimately want! And when we meddle—remember, God is not going to share His glory with any ma—when we have our hand in . . . My mom used to say this, “If we are clinging to the promises of God, then we can’t meddle in our circumstances.” If our hands are down here meddling in the circumstances, we’re not holding to the promises of God!

So I want just to say a real quick prayer for each of us. Now, I will give you just some practical things: just to recognize that this is really completely out of your control. Control is really an illusion in your life. And I can tell you from a rebellious child’s perspective, there was nothing my parents could have done. I hated them, I hated God, and I was full of evil.

I remember one time I was listening to an Alice Cooper song about poison running through his veins, and I thought, Yes! I want evil running through my veins! I was an evil, hateful, narcissistic person, and no amount of love from my parents was going to fix that.

It wasn’t human love I needed at that point, although I did, but that’s not enough to fix that kind of hate and evil. I needed the power of God! I didn’t need to just be a better person. I think sometimes we think, If I can just draw them to myself, and I can show them how loving I am, then they will see what a good Christian I am, and they will see Jesus in me!”

Now, He can use you to be a light, but it’s when we exalt Jesus, not when we exalt ourselves. I think so often we think that we’re exalting Jesus, but we’re actually exalting ourselves, and we want our child to see how loving we are. 

There is an idolatry in the church of wanting to be loved by the world, of wanting to be loved by our children. Jesus said we’d be hated! When we truly live for Christ, they will hate us. And He said, “It’s Me that they hate, it’s Me they’ve rejected.” Remember that we are living for an eternal kingdom!

One of my most favorite passages is in Hebrews 11. It talks about all these saints that died in faith, and it says: “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them . . . afar off, and they were convinced of them and persuaded of them (vv. 14–16, paraphrased).

It says, if they had been mindful of that country from which they came out of, they would have had opportunity to return. But now, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. And this next line just blew me away. It says, “Wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.”

And that struck me, and I thought, Well, what’s the opposite of that?” If we love this world more than we love God, and if our eyes are on this world--if we’re living for this world, is God ashamed to be called our God?

This says if we desire a better country, if we’re living for an eternal kingdom, if we’re living for the Eternal King, God is not ashamed to be called our God. I want to live for God and I hope that my prodigals come with me. I pray for them. I want them to come to know the Lord. And yes, we should be grieved, but are you as grieved about the millions of lost souls around you?

And in fact, you can be the answer to someone else’s prayer. I mean, not that you’re the answer, but you can be a vessel for the Lord that answers somebody else’s prayer. In fact, recently we met a parent on a call who got so excited when I mentioned that.

She said, “Yes! Recently the Lord put it on my heart . . .” She met this girl who was homeless, she was on drugs, she’d been on and off drugs for years. She took her into her home. They loved on her, and they got into rehab, and she gave her life to Christ; this girl is doing amazing!

Later they heard from her parents, sobbing, her parents said, “We’ve been praying for her for years!” So often God will use someone else, because this is not about your glory, it’s about His.

And so our response in this should be to surrender our child, surrender our desired outcome, and ask for His will to be done. Your hope cannot be in your child. Your hope is not in your circumstances, for better circumstances. Your hope can be in Christ alone! Because everything else in this world will fail you at times.

We don’t have any kind of guaranteed outcome. What we have is a guarantee of Jesus Christ, that He will never fail, that His Word will never fail, that He can give us peace and joy in the midst of horrible circumstances, that He can keep us safe in the storm, that He can calm the storm in His timing.

But there may be a moment where He holds you in the midst of that storm, preventing you from going, even though Jesus Himself was the One that told the disciples to go toward Bethsaida (see Mark 6:45). He was the One that told them to go across the sea, and yet the Holy Spirit, the Wind, held them there at that point. Why? That they would have a greater revelation of Christ!

And that’s what this is all about. Let me pray for you, and then I want to play a song for us and after that. I want us to just stand and worship, but let me pray.

Heavenly Father, I thank You for each and every woman represented here, for each child or loved one who’s represented. God, I just pray in Jesus’ name that You would draw their hearts unto You. I pray You’d convict them of sin. I pray You’d humble their hearts. I pray You would call them, Lord, and I just pray you’d open their spiritual eyes! Lord, we cannot open the eyes of the blind, but you can, Jesus!

And we pray You’d pursue them, and we pray you’d remind them of the things that they learned as children. God, I pray for each and every parent here, every loved one, that you would calm them in the midst of the storm, that You would heal their broken hearts, that you would prepare for them for the day that that prodigal would come home! Lord, I pray that You’d give them joy and peace in the midst of the storm. I know people used to ask my mom how she had such peace.

Lord, I just pray that You’d give them the peace that passes all understanding. You promised that those who kept their minds steadfast on You would be kept at perfect peace. You said in Your name is everlasting peace!

So Lord, I just pray in Jesus’ name, that You would draw each and every heart here back to a deeper relationship with You, wherever they’re at today. Draw them deep beneath the flood of Your presence, that in the midst of the storm they can keep their eyes on you and not on their circumstances. And I thank You and praise You for these things, in Jesus’ name, amen.