Remembering Their Experiences

Yesterday my son told me, "Stop praying now." His words were likely spurred on by his frustration at staying still, which is contrary to his innate desire to be in constant motion. Still his words made me pause and wonder if he understood why I was praying for him. At that moment I'm not sure he did, even though he is familiar with prayer and joins us as we pray throughout the day.

I was reading Psalm 78 this morning and it was talking about sharing God's law with your children. Verse 4 says, "We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done." The psalm continues on to list the wondrous things God had done for the Israelites and the choices of the people to obey or forsake God. This passage was a reminder that we must fully instruct our children about God. We must teach them about how He's touched our lives and also remind them of the experiences of our parents and grandparents, ancestors if you will, and the impact of their choices to either obey or forsake God.

This topic: "where does our faith come from," is one I've seen people struggle with when considering the generations of faith in their family and the impact of some cultures taking on faith in Jesus only because they were forced to or because it was a societal norm. It's impossible to think on this topic and not consider the shocking and sad methods that were used to convert people to Jesus. However, when we focus on that alone, we overlook the true conviction that people have also experienced. We forget the realness of the Holy Spirit at work leading us to Jesus and through Jesus, to God.

Recently, I listened to a radio message about the Holy Spirit and the message made sense to me. I've been thinking a lot about the Holy Spirit, so it was awesome to hear someone else discussing it. The speaker stated that the Holy Spirit convinces us that something is missing in our lives, even in the lives of people that are "good,"  and shows us our need for God. The Holy spirit can help us be obedient to God and live an empowered life. Just as important, the Holy Spirit can be resisted and ignored, thus leaving us to follow our own will. I thought about this in the lens of - here is the answer for those with this burning question about where our faith comes from.

So, where does my heritage of faith come from? What remembrances do I need to share with the next generation?

Before my son was born, we shared his chosen middle name with my mother. She was shocked and asked where we got it because it was not a popular Nigerian name. I told her that it was just a name I found and the meaning really touched me: "well made by God", or in another translation, "God is looked upon as the arbiter and as such the place and right of the name bearer are not in doubt." She then shared with me the story of her uncle who built a church in his community. His efforts were met with resistance and it landed him in jail for going against the norm. Still he held on to his convictions because the Holy Spirit had convinced him that the salvation message of Jesus was true and suffering was worth it if it meant spreading this truth. It just so happened that her uncle's name was a very close variation of our son's name. 

My mother came to believe in Jesus through conviction by the Holy Spirit. Even though her immediate family was not Christian, her father encouraged her faith, likely because he remembered her uncle's belief despite his suffering. She also believed after hearing the miraculous experiences of others who trusted in God for protection and were delivered. She believed after experiencing God's protection in her own life.

That is not all I need to remember and share. I also need to remember my father who was an eloquent evangelist who preached the gospel to hundreds, but tried to mix God's truths and power with his own distortions. The end result was him grieving the Holy Spirit and losing his family, status, and at many times, losing his mind.

The urge of Psalm 78 is to remember our history with God. A history where our forebearers were enlightened to the rightness of God. A history that shows their painful experiences when they went their own way. We need to talk about this history and see God's realness. See how the Holy Spirit has been active in bringing our family and ourselves to Jesus. The Psalm says to do this so, "that the generation to come might know them [God's laws], even the children which should be born; who should arise and declare them to their children: that they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments..." (78:6-7)

My two year old will likely not understand our history of faith right now, but I plan to share it with him to help build his own faith in God. After he told me to stop praying, I shared with him the reasons why I pray. I told him I want him to be well and protected so I pray for him all the time. This sweet child changed his mind and wanted me to pray and in turn, he wanted to pray for his uncle, grandma and grandpa!

Let's not be confused about our faith and the rightness of it. The Holy Spirit is real and personal and is working to bring us to Jesus. Let's be confident in this.