Standing in the Gap with Scripture: Using the Word of God to Fight for Your Prodigal

Mary: Thank you so much. It's good to be here with you. How many of you women are in this room because you have a prodigal or someone in your life who just your heart aches over their departure from the Christian faith?

Yeah, just virtually everybody. I need to say that it's a unique heartache. I think it's a heartache that's different than other types of heartaches. It's a unique type of heartache watching a loved one wander away from faith or to do self-destructive things. You're feeling hopeless, like you're watching this train crash happen, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. And sometimes when you try, it just makes things worse. 

But here's the thing, Father God understands the agony. I mean, ultimately, He's the perfect father, and He understands what it is to have wayward children. Now, it may not be a child, it may be, for you, a husband; it may be a sister or a friend or someone in your life that you are watching move away from faith. But often it's children. I know that many of you, it will be your children that your heart is broken over. 

I'm going to give you a few principles for dealing with the situation of having a prodigal in your life. These are principles that I covered on a podcast about prodigals. So they should be also available if you want to review them later. I'm just going to review them quickly, but then we're going to go through standing in the gap with Scripture using the Word of God to fight your for your prodigal. 

Revive Our Hearts was good enough to do an eight page handout for each one of you. I actually told them you could do four pages, double sided. And I'm so glad that they did this for me. I wanted to send you home with a resource and equip you with something that you can tuck into your Bibles, something that you can use as you walk this journey, as you fight these battles. 

Let's just pray. Heavenly Father, I just ask for You to just make Your presence known among us through Your Holy Spirit. A lot of women in this room are hurting, a lot of wanderers. We just long to see them come home. We don't understand. Lord, I just pray for Your sweet Spirit, because You are good and You love us, and You love our prodigals even more than we do.

So I just pray that You watch and guard our hearts through this time. Give us strength, give us courage, give us faith, give us hope, give us a certainty in the goodness of Your character and Your love. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Okay, so just a few principles with dealing with prodigals. First of all, I think it's really important that you keep the big picture in mind, because often when you're dealing with a prodigal, especially if it's a child or someone close to you, or a growing child, or even an adult child, it's easy to think about the symptom as the problem. The symptom is not the problem. It's just a symptom of the problem.

So whether it's alcoholism, whether it's drug abuse, whether it's it's any kind of substance abuse, whether it's a marital breakdown, whether it's some challenges with identity or sexuality or homosexuality or same sex. Whatever it is, you have to remember that that's a symptom, that's not the problem.

So you can have a child, or you can have a relationship with someone who does all the right things and their lives are absolutely perfect. Maybe it's a son that got married and has children, is attending church and has a good job and isn't abusing drugs, and is being everything that he ought to be. Well, he can be a prodigal too. His heart can be far from God too, even if externally he has all the right kind of things. 

So when you're praying, you want to be remembering that the problem is the problem, and not to be focusing on the symptom. The problem is a heart that is uncommitted and unsubmitted to the Lord. That's the problem. It's a spiritual problem. The drug abuse or the alcohol abuse or the sexuality, that's a symptom of the problem of the heart that is not submitted to Jesus Christ. 

So just having that shift in keeping the big picture in mind will help you understand that you're not striving for this symptom to be fixed. You're striving, in prayer, for the problem to be fixed. You want the heart made right with Jesus. Even if the symptom gets fixed, it doesn't necessarily mean that the heart is right with Jesus. So you want to keep the big picture in mind in terms of what you are really yearning for and what you're really asking the Lord for and what the true problem is.

So that brings us to number two: fight the battle on the right front. Now, this is a spiritual battle. When you are dealing with a prodigal who has wandered away from the faith, it is a spiritual battle. So nagging, lecturing, coming up with strategies . . . I mean, sometimes you have to take your kid to detox. There are things that you need to do, but it is ultimately a spiritual battle. Second Corinthians 10:3–5: 

Though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ. 

So this is a battle you fight on your knees. I think that many of you will know that the more you try to fight the battle on a worldly front by lecturing or nagging or shaming or whatever it is trying to intervene, sometimes that's just counterproductive. This is a spiritual battle, and it needs spiritual warfare in order to fight this battle.

So, you'll want to be spending a lot of time in prayer, and you'll also want to call in reinforcements of the community, the support of a few faithful praying friends. I think that when we pray in community, there is a strength there that we tap into.

I'm glad that there's so many of us here. We're going to spend a little bit of time praying with each other, because we all know what that is to fight for someone that you love. It's important to actually have somebody in your life where you are able to fight the battle on a spiritual front with them.

Principle number three, be aware of Satan tactics. Be aware of the devil's tactics. Now, the first tactic is lies and deceit. John 8:44: 

You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 

So what is really difficult about dealing with the prodigal is there's just so much, it's so muddled. There are lies; there are deceptions. You don't know what's true. You don't know what's not true.

One of the main prayers that I had for my children, as they were still in my home, was, Lord, please reveal sin. If there's sin in this house, let me see it and make it clear and and reveal it and reveal it early. 

And the Lord did. There were instances when we were able to intervene. And because we were, because the Lord was the one that revealed the lies and the deception and the falsehood that Satan was trying to promote . . . So be aware of lies and deceit, that you're going to be dealing with a lot of things. You don't even know what's true. You don't know what's not true. You don't know when you're being misled. You don't know when you're being lied to. You don't know because that's the devil's tactics. That's a big tactic. 

Another tactic that is really, really hard to combat is that the evil one is the accuser of the brethren. He will mock you. He will mock those who walk with the Lord and just mock them relentlessly. How many of you, and this is a really personal question, you don't have to answer, but I think there are so many in the same boat here. 

How many of you have ever felt shame or guilt or embarrassment? It was your fault. Was there something else you could have done? Or feeling that you’re a bad mom, or that that

you should have paid attention to this, or should have paid attention to that? I think this is one of the main enemy tactics. This is a principle that when you're dealing with prodigal children, especially children, but also others. 

The evil one is going to want to mock you. He's a mocker. He's going to want to shame you, want to embarrass you. He wants you to keep things hidden and in the dark and not to let anybody know. He wants you to feel ashamed if your child is walking in a path of ungodliness. So you have to know that. But here's the thing, God has prodigal children . . . and He's the perfect father.

You do your best. We live in a fallen world. Yes, we make mistakes, but what Satan wants to do is beat you up about it. And what the Lord wants to do is shore you up and strengthen your bones and help you stand and help you stand unashamed. 

This is the way it is. This is the battle we're fighting. We live in a broken, fallen world, and I'm not going to play the devil's games. I'm not going to take that shame and guilt upon myself, because really, what if the devil wins on that front, he's taking out not only your prodigal he's taking out you and making you ineffective.

Revelation 12:10, the devil is the accuser of the brethren. So that is a common, common thing. I know many of you, you've already indicated it, many of you in this room, just there is a heartache and a shame. You know that, “I've done my best. I have tried to raise this child in the ways of the Lord.” And then it's just like a child that rejects those ways so thoroughly. 

Maybe you're dealing with children who are transitioning gender, or who if your friends come over to your house and your child happens to be there is dressed in all kinds of weird stuff, or is just involved in such stuff that you don't even want your other relatives to see what this person is doing in terms of how sinful and their lives have become.

So don't give in to that accuser of the brethren that's going to come. You can expect that.

It is a temptation, and it is a strategy of the evil one to take you out, to take out as many people as possible through what is going on in the life of the prodigal.

Number four: be prepared to do the right thing, even if it is the hard thing. In the story of David and Absalom in the Old Testament, you remember that David had a son that all of a sudden turned against him, plotted against him, and wanted to take over the kingdom. He got a whole bunch of people on his side and then went out to fight against his dad, and David had to flee. Then there ended up being a battle, and Absalom was actually killed. David was heartbroken, absolutely heartbroken for his son—his son who was wayward and then ended up dying. But he had to do the right thing, what God called him to. He had to stand on what was true and on what was right. That's really difficult. 

I think that oftentimes it's just a thorny path to walk. You don't know how to walk it. You don't know how to make those decisions in terms of, what does this mean for family relationships? What does this mean? Can I invite my other little nieces and nephews over? Is that healthy to be exposing them to that? Like, how do you even do that? How do you make those decisions? It's not easy. Your daughter comes and says, I'm I'm not. Don't talk to me about a she anymore. “I'm changing my name. Call me ‘him,’ ‘her,’ or call me ‘they.’” What do you do? How do you deal with that? 

And I must say that it requires such dependence on the Holy Spirit because I don't think there's a formula. I don't think there's an answer. I think you love the best as you can, but you need to be prepared to do what is right. There comes a time when you know that, “You cannot live here anymore.” There comes a time when it's, “As much as I love you, I cannot. I cannot, before my God and what I believe to be true in my convictions. I will love you, and go to the end of the earth for you, but I cannot.” So I think you have to be prepared to do the right thing, even if it's the hard thing. You do your best to go as far as you can, but there is a line sometimes. 

Jesus said that truth has consequences for family relationships sometimes. Mark 13:12 is a very, very difficult passage, but it's true. “Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death because of me.” Jesus said, “If you love your child more than you love Me, you're not worthy of Me.” Wow! How do you even live with a gospel where there's such cost to following Jesus? 

Let me tell you that this is probably the primary reason why I think there's such a drift even in the church. We're seeing that the church is compromising on morality. The church is compromising on standards that five / ten, years ago, would have never taken that position. Now it's all of a sudden changed its position, because you have such compassion for those who are straying, and compassion for those who are living a way that is not according to the gospel.

So it's easier to bend the gospel than it is to stand firm on it and to in faith say, “No. God is good. His ways are good. His ways are right. And though it cost me my life, I will follow Jesus.”

Number five, stay on mission.It's so easy to let the prodigal problem distract you from the other things the Lord wants you to do. It’s so easy for it to become the problem in your life, and the problem that distracts you from other people or from other purposes or other mission. Where it's like, “How can I be involved in women's ministry when I have a child that is XYZ? How can I be running a Bible study? How can by teaching people about marriage when I'm having difficulty in my marriage? How can I be doing a parenting class when one of my kids is so messed up?”

You want a turtle, you want to hide, and you want to say, “ That's the problem, and until that is fixed, I can't do anything else.” That's a temptation against Satan trying to sideline more than one of you. You need to stay on mission. What is your mission? The Great Commission, Matthew 28:19—as you're going, you make disciples. So you need to keep that mission and not let the problem become the only thing that you see. 

Stay on mission with your personal pursuit of godliness. You cannot control what your prodigal does, but you can control how you respond. You can control, and you ought to be controlling and searching your own heart, because it could very well be that you are not behaving in humility, that you are not pursuing wisdom, that you are not speaking the truth in love. 

Maybe it’s a screaming match that you do have something to repent of, that you do need to pursue forgiveness for. Being hurt repeatedly, you need to guard your mouth. You need to be the first one to the cross. So you need to stay on mission with that. That takes a lot of humility, a lot of reliance on the Holy Spirit. 

Number six, persist. I love the story in Luke where the widow keeps knocking on the judge's door, and just keeps knocking. He gets kind of annoyed because she just won't stop knocking on his door. In the parable it says, “Yet, because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming” (see Luke 18:5). 

You are in it for the long haul when you have a prodigal child. Perhaps the Lord may be good, and it just may be a few months. But it may be years, and it may be even like until the day you die, where you are holding and you do not see the answer to the prayer. Now, you pray for it, and you persist, and you knock on that door, because that's what God wants us to do—to keep coming and to persist. 

There's two dangers. The one danger is to make the problem the only thing that you see in life, the only thing that your whole life revolves around. The other thing is to put the problem over there and just to continue on as if their problem didn't exist, because it's just too painful to deal with. So, there's two extremes. I don't think either is a scriptural, biblical way to deal with it. 

Principle number seven, never ever, ever, ever, ever lose sight of the character of God, His goodness. He is a good father. He loves your prodigal more than you love your prodigal. His goodness, His character. Do you not know that it's God's kindness that's meant to lead you to repentance? He's the God of faith. He's the God of hope. He's the God of all hope. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. (Romans 15:13). 

So the thing that gives you hope, the most hope, is not that you see the way through, but that you know the One who knows the way through. You know the character of the God who loves you and who has promises in Scripture for you. You know the character of God who is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to Him. You know the character of the God whose heart breaks when He sees people just so broken in sin, that God loves your prodigal. When you know God, and when you gaze at God and His character, then it puts things in perspective. So, if you're looking at the problem, the problem becomes big. If you're looking at a God that's big, the problem becomes smaller. 

All right, so those are just some general principles. You can pull out your handout. We're dealing with The Word: Behold the Wonder for all weekend, all the sessions; that's kind of our theme and our focus. So, we're talking about standing in the gap with Scripture and using the Word of God to fight for your prodigal. Here are ten ways that you can use Scripture to help you pray boldly for the spiritual awakening and restoration of the one that you love. 

Now, I think that you probably will be familiar with some of these, but hopefully this will help you. It will also give you some Scriptures that you can turn to and look at and rely on for strength as you are praying, because this is a battle that you fight on your knees. This is a battle that grandmas fight for their grandkids, that wives fight for their husbands, moms fight for their kids, sisters fight for their sister. Generally speaking, when God moves in somebody's life, there has usually been a trail of somebody who has impacted them or prayed for them. 

Person first. The first way you can use Scripture to pray boldly is to personalize Scripture promises with the prodigal’s name. This is really easy. So if it's Joe, and you come across Ezekiel 36:26 that's talking about giving a new heart and putting a new spirit within you. You just pray that. You personalize that and say, “Oh Lord, give a new heart to Joe and create a new spirit within him. Oh Lord, I pray that you will just stir Jane up and make her heart from a heart of stone to a heart of flesh.” 

So you just pray the Bible, because you cannot pray wrong when you pray the Bible. When you're praying the Bible, you are praying in the will of God. There is power in the Word of God, and there is power when we claim the promises of God and just pray them. Sometimes you don't even know what to pray, but you can pray Scripture. 

Number two, you can turn Scripture parables and stories into prayers. So, for instance, you can look at the stories of God's faithfulness and just pick one of those stories or one of those parables and just personalize it, either for your prodigal or for yourself. You could say, “Lord, I'm knocking on Your door like the widow was knocking on the door of the judge. I'm coming to You and I'm crying out to You, and You have said that You will answer.” So just taking those examples of God's faithfulness in Scripture or the stories in parables, you can turn those into prayers. 

Number three is my favorite because this is the foundation. God's character is the foundation of our hope. God's character is the foundation of our trust and our faith. Oftentimes in Scripture you see people appealing to God's character. “God, You have said You will never forsake us. Be near. God, You promised this. God, You are merciful, You are mighty, You are holy. God, this is who You are. I acknowledge who You tell me You are. I am hanging on to that for dear life. 

So these are my favorite ones, some of the names of God: El Roi—You are the God who sees. You're the God who sees everything that I don't see, everything that's hidden from me.

You're the God who sees my loved one. You are the God who sees the sin. You're the God who sees the depths of the brokenness and the pain. You are the God who sees all things. You are God with us.

You are Emmanuel—You are God with me. You are God of this universe. You are God overall. You are at all times present. There is nowhere that my loved one can go to hide from Your presence. You're the Lamb of God who died, shed blood. You're the Good Shepherd. 

And then pray the attributes of God: that God is eternal. God is immutable. God is omniscient. God is omnipresent. God is infinite. God is sovereign. “God, You're writing the story, and I don't know what it is, but I know that for those who love You, all things work together for good. God, I know You are love. You are pure love. You know what love is? Would you please reveal Your love, make Your kindness known?” 

So those are my favorite types of prayers, or prayers that really pull out the faithfulness and appeal to God's character; where you're talking to your Father and you're just saying, “I know this about You, and I stake my claim on it, not only for myself, but for my loved one.” 

You pray also for conviction of sin and for repentance. You’re just asking the Lord in His goodness. Second Timothy 2:25–26, “Lord that you may grant her repentance leading to knowledge of the truth. May she come to her senses and escape from the snare of the devil. May she see the devil's snare for what it is.” So just praying for that conviction of sin and for repentance. Again, scriptural prayers, prayers grounded in Scripture. Prayers that take the Word of God and just stake your heart into the Word of God. Those are powerful prayers. 

Pray for protection against the enemy. You are dealing with a very, very wily, evil enemy who comes only to steal and to kill and destroy. That enemy, again, is a spiritual fight, a spiritual battle against principalities and powers in dark places. That's the battle that we do. So we pray for protection. 

You remember the Lord's Prayer. How does it go? 

Our Father, who art in heaven, 
Hallowed be thy name. 
Thy kingdom come, 
Thy will be done 
on earth as it is in heaven. 
Give us this day our daily bread. 
And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. 
[And then what it comes?]
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. (Matt. 6:9–13 KJV)

Wow, there's a really good Scripture prayer right there for your prodigal! Lead her not into temptation. Deliver her from evil. Lead him not into temptation. Deliver him from evil. Just if there's a place or a thing or a person that is going to draw him away from God, Lord, lead him not into temptation. Protect him. Deliver him from evil, “for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever.” 

Pray for godly influence. God is weaving stories together that we are not going to know until we see Him face to face. We don't know how all the stories fit together or His purposes. We heard this morning of just getting a virus and getting sepsis and losing your limbs. Your, “How? Why God? What is your character? What are you doing?” Well, He's doing something. Fact, He's doing probably a lot of somethings just in our lives, in the lives of your prodigal that you don't even know. So just to stay faithful and pray for godly influences He's going to bring people into your loved one's life. It may not be you. Your only role may be to keep your mouth shut and to stay on your knees. I heard a few amens on that one. Keep your mouth shut, except when you're talking to God.

Pray for godly influence, because He has a whole army of people that He can bring into your loved one's life to impact them in ways for the gospel that would astonish you and amaze you. He can even use the ungodly. He can even use people who are all enmeshed in evil to direct and point your child or your loved one back to the Lord. His purposes will not be thwarted. 

Pray Scriptures of renewal restoration. “I will heal their apostasy. I will love them freely. I will restore health to you and your wounds. I will heal, declares the Lord.” I think one of the most difficult things about praying for a prodigal is when you know that the choices that that person is making, you know the consequences of those kinds of choices and just how devastating they are for making life work. Well, those consequences can be. So, just praying for renewal, for restoration. God is just, a God of redemption. He can redeem the story at any point.

Number eight, offer prayers of thanksgiving and faith. This is one that we often miss. I love Philippians 4:6, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, with prayer and petition, make your request known to God. And the God of peace, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (vv. 6–7). What an amazing promise! 

Making those prayers of thanksgiving. “Thank you, God, that You love my loved one more than I do. Thank You, God, that You are at work in ways that I cannot even see. Thank You, God, that You are weaving a story here. You are sovereign, and even though it seems like the biggest mess possible, God, You are above all and over all and working all things for good.” So offering those prayers of thanksgiving and faith and just not letting the evil one get one on you. 

There's a Canadian songwriter that wrote a song about how in prayer what you're doing is you're kicking holes in the darkness till it bleeds daylight. You’re just like, “Oh, right, and I'm going to keep kicking at that darkness, because I have the power of Jesus Christ in me, and I have the authority of the Word of God, and I have the promises of the Creator of the universe. Then I'm going to keep coming against it. Maybe it's just a pinhole of light at first, but God will write the story.” 

Claim the power and the promises of intercession. Again, this is very similar to claiming the names of God, the character of God. These are the power. What you're doing in this is you're claiming the promises of Scripture. You're saying, “God, You said that if I come to You, that You will hear and You will answer.” Now, God doesn't always answer how I want, when I want, in the way I want, but He does answer. 

A combined prayer and fasting. We see in Scripture that Jesus even said to His disciples there's no movement on this kind of darkness unless you pray and fast. This is a biggie. This one needs some serious, serious spiritual intervention. So you might want to consider that. You might want to consider setting aside a time for prayer and fasting. You might want to research more of what that looks like if you've never done it before. Or you might want to do a regular time of prayer and fasting, set aside a day a week, or set aside a day a month when you would meet with a girlfriend or two, perhaps some other moms who have prodigals that you want to pray with. 

So the prayer and fasting is also a huge tool that God has equipped us with for fighting spiritual battles. Do not neglect it. It's hard sometimes, but there is a just a spiritual power that comes with it. It's not a guarantee. It's not like a formula, like, “Okay, God, if I pray and I fast, then You better answer the way that I want, when I want, how I want.” But it is something that unleashes just a spiritual power. We're told that there's a more focused and directed power when we exercise that discipline along with prayer. 

Here's another suggestion, prayer journal. I would really suggest that you write some of your prayers out. I have a leather journal that when I'm reading Scripture often, I'll see the scriptural promise, and I'll personalize and I'll write a prayer out. And, you know, more and more pages get filled and it's just a good way to pray. It's a good way to really pray with discipline. 

I've heard stories. Christopher Yuan’s mom did that and filled up, I don't know how many, journals with prayers. Then when he came to know the Lord, he's got all those journals of the prayers of His mom for him, and it's just a powerful thing in his life. 

Incidentally, pray for him. He had a terrible accident a couple weeks ago and had to go for surgery. He is paralyzed and the Lord is restoring some of his mobility, but he has a long path ahead of him for that. But it’s just an amazing story, and it's the prayers of his mom that transformed, and it was the journals full of prayers that really moved him and worked in his life. 

Okay, we have got just less than fifteen minutes left. What I would like you to do is I want to make this practical. I want you to gather in groups of two or three, and I want you to pray for your loved ones. You can just share a name, but you don't have to share a name if you don't want to. Get together in groups and pray for your loved ones to come home, to come home to the Lord. You don't have to share a lot of details, and in fact, it's probably better if you keep your story to less than a sentence so that there's more time for prayer. 

You can use some of the Scriptures that are on here, or you can open up your Bible. You can open up to Psalm 119 that we've been digging into a lot. Psalm 130, whatever, you can just open it up and just begin to pray. These prayers are going up like incense, or, as my husband said, “Like kites flying up to heaven.” 

Oh Father, you love the ones we love even more than we You. I pray for broken hearts in this room. I pray for women for whom it is so wearisome to labor in prayer for so long, Lord, I pray that You will fill us with faith and with hope, and, above all, with trust in Your goodness. 

May we stay on mission. May we fight this battle. May we endure. May we persevere. May we be the ones who are standing in the gap and the champions for the ones that we love. 

Lord, would You honor our hearts? Would You just in your grace and Your kindness bring many, many loved ones home this year? We just pray for a revival in the church, but we pray for just a calling back of all these children, all these sisters and all of these friends, brothers, who once tasted the sweetness. 

So Lord, I pray that truth will break through falsehood, that light will break through darkness, that Your power will break through the power of the evil one, because You are greater, and we trust You. Though our hearts ache, we trust You. We love You, and we will stand firm on who You are. And Lord, if it takes till the day we die, we want to remain faithful and pray. We want to ask You to just guide all of these prodigals home, just because of who You are, because You're a good Father. In Jesus' name, amen.