Another Generation Grew Up

After that generation died, another generation grew up who did not acknowledge the LORD or remember the mighty things he had done for Israel. The Israelites did evil in the LORD’s sight and served the images of Baal. They abandoned the LORD, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They went after other gods, worshiping the gods of the people around them. And they angered the LORD. Judges 2:10-12

THE GENERATION THAT had been small children when the Israelites walked away from Egypt and through the Red Sea had died. Gone, too, was the next generation who marched around Jericho for seven days and saw its walls fall down. Something terrible had happened as that generation died off: Those who’d first entered the Promised Land had failed to pass along a living faith to their children. This new generation had heard the stories about Yahweh and his powerful deliverance, guidance, and provision, but they hadn’t experienced them. This generation was much like our own —born into prosperity and fascinated with the search for spiritual meaning among the many options presented in the colliding cultures around them. They saw God’s Word as terribly old-fashioned and irrelevant.

As parents, we want the secret formula for passing along a living faith to our children, and we are frustrated that there is none. But surely our kids need more than to hear about how we have experienced God in the past or even the present. Surely our children need to be involved in ongoing experiences of putting faith to the test. Yet most of us do everything we can to avoid situations in which our families are forced to depend on God as our only hope, our only supplier, our only security. But if the next generation is going to know the Lord, they have to know more than Bible stories or even correct doctrine. They have to experience what it means to trust God to deliver on his promised help. Maybe we shouldn’t always be so quick to be our children’s savior. Maybe we should be willing to allow our children to experience the need for God to come to their rescue and discover how he does that.

Lord, we don’t want the story of the next generation of Israelites to be the story of the next generation in our family. We long for ________ to experience your saving power in her life, not just read about it or hear about it. Keep us from trying to be ________’s savior. Keep us from trying to protect ________ from every trouble and every need that would require her to look to you.