Adult Children, pt. 4

Part One, Part Two, Part Three

Some parents, after having poured heart and soul into children for eighteen to twenty-two years, especially now see them falter as adults.  They are told by many, if not most, close to all, that nothing can be done about it.  They should negotiate a surrender where maybe they can split differences and straddle the huge gap that exists.  These are after all, adults.  Furthermore, part of good negotiation with adults is to allow them to make their own choices, because if you do, the consequential good will might entitle you to some select bouts of instruction to nudge both sides closer.   Problem:  this strategy isn't in the Bible.

Parents of adult children can let the non-scriptural belief and practice go.  That's okay.  It's something Christians can and should do with anyone.  Adult children can be released from the non-scriptural requirements of their childhood.  However, unscriptural positions and behavior can't be tolerated, shouldn't be.

Scripture does guide toward "letting things go". . . . for unbelievers.  Jesus talked about the dusting of one's feet of an unbelieving village.  He said not to sow pearls before swine.  Swine are not believers in that picture.  Jesus began speaking in parables so that unbelievers would not be further hardened.  That is a method of letting an unbeliever go.  I agree in a stopping point of preaching to an unbeliever.  In most instances, I give an unbeliever one shot and then I move on.  The unbeliever makes this clear.  "Stop talking to me."  If he could put it another way:  "I don't want to hear the truth anymore, because I'm settled in my lifestyle or life's path."  At that point in time a parent would be judging himself to have an unsaved adult child.

When I let go of an unbeliever, that's not a good moment for the unbeliever.  At the moment he's being let go, that might be finality for him.  He's done for.  His next stop might be hell, likely is.  People who want to be let go probably don't know what they're asking for, and I wish they knew.

God calls the letting people go, "turning them over."  At the time to the unbeliever, it feels like a privilege, something to rationalize as a good thing.  Adult children may think things have gotten better for them with their parents, because they don't feel their parents looking over their shoulder and the relationship has improved, when in fact it's just that the parents have put adult children into the unbeliever category, and turned them over.  Their delight unfettered in fleshly lust is actually a parent who has given up on them like God does with unbelievers.  Friends and sometimes relatives celebrate with and for this child.  It's a hellish, nightmarish moment, viewed as splendid.

I was talking to a sibling of the adult child of a very prominent, godly pastor.  His church is well known.  His son is an atheist.  I understand not confronting that child any more on a regular basis.  I wouldn't give up, but attempts at reconciliation would be diminished exponentially.

As long as there is the indication that one is dealing with a believing adult child, the truth should be told.  Believers respond favorably to the truth.  They don't say, stop telling me that.  Even if they don't want it at the moment, the truth will work to a desired end.  Telling the truth is what Jesus did.  It is what all the epistles teach, the position of the apostles.  If one stops telling someone the truth, he is admitting that he's probably got an unbeliever now on his hands.  It isn't loving to stop telling someone the truth if he is a believer.  Jesus said the truth is the basis for sanctification (John 17:17) and it is what sets someone free from what is nasty in his life (John 8:32).

The conflict in the short term with an adult child is worth it.  I'm saying that based upon scripture.  The battle, the clash, and the tension are painful.  "Endure hardness as a good soldier," Paul reminded.  Spiritual warfare is warfare.  No one says war is pretty.  The northern general, William Tecumseh Sherman, said, "War is hell."

Noah's Adult Children

When Noah and his family exited the ark, they met complete devastation, billions of deaths and a world physically torn to bits.  As life started in the aftermath of that, God points out what was significant to Him.  Not much material is included from the beginning of the post-flood era in which we still live today, but all of what God could address, He accosted an adult sons' treatment of his father.

In Genesis 9, Noah got drunk and naked in a shameful way.  The passage focuses on two disparate reactions from one son and then the other two in verses 22-23:

22  Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without. 23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's nakedness.

"Saw," the original use of that term, implies that Ham gazed on his father without his modesty or without dignity, without the covering that provides a boundary for fallen human relationships, with some measure of delight.  He found some pleasure, some delight in his father's shame and in his father's dishonor.  This is the attitude of a rebellious son, something of glee and satisfaction because somebody respected and revered and honored falls.

The passage doesn't explain Ham's problem with his dad, but as one works one's way through scripture, backed then also by personal experience, Bible students would know that sons can develop resentment toward fathers for varied reasons.  A father restricts his son, says "no," doesn't allow him to have his way.   Ham was cooped up with his dad in a small space.  For years, he had been overseen in building the ark in the first place, hard labor with parental scrutiny.  Noah was a righteous man, not sinlessly perfect, but righteous.  Ham would have been about 100 years old at the time of this post-flood event.

When Noah got drunk and then took his clothes off in an uninhibited way in fitting with the influence of alcohol, Genesis doesn't record his having taken responsibility for the deed.  It doesn't mean that he didn't.  The emphasis of the passage is the deed of Ham, his disrespect, and then the punishment skipping to the unbelieving grandson, which would have been harsh chastisement for Ham, to see what he lost and to live with that regret.

Noah's example didn't take away responsibility from Ham.  Children aren't going to see perfection from their parents and this doesn't excuse their own negative emotions.  They don't inherit the victim card and embrace entitlement, whether real or imagined.  I would assess most to be imagined.  It's easy for anyone to feel sorry for his first world problems, essentially his feelings hurt because he was confronted for a wrong doing.  He slouched in his chair and dad told him to sit up in front of his friends.  He can't let it go, and now he justifies continued childish or boorish behavior because of his experience.  Children often take a myopic view of their lives, shrinking the world down to the inside of a barrel, so that everything looks like the barrel.

As a further insult, Ham went outside and told his two brothers, which is the ugly sin of ridicule or the further sin of disrespect. He should have covered his father, protecting him, but instead, he recruited his other brothers to join in the ridicule. This was an attitude of disdain, an unloving attitude in contrast to love covering.  Disdain or bitterness or animosity exposes it.  Love doesn't want to think evil or bear evil tales. Resentment does. Ham had resentment for his father, which is a serious breach of the later fifth commandment, honor your father and your mother.

One commentator says that Ham desecrated a natural and sacred barrier. His going out to tell his brothers about it and without covering his dad aggravated the act, because of this breach of propriety.  Men care about honoring their father.  Ham dishonored his father, and God then brought shame into his family.

This is placed in sharp contrast to the other sons, as seen in verse 23.  They had an appropriate sense of shame. They would find no pleasure in their father's indiscretion. This shows what kind of sons they were.  They loved their father and they showed respect for him. They put a garment over their shoulders and they backed in, covered him, and refused to be a part of Ham's disrespect.  They rebuke Ham by their behavior.

How serious was the disrespect of Ham to God?  God cursed his son, Canaan, and we know what that meant?  The Canaanites were annihilated from the earth.  The people reading Genesis first were preparing to enter the land and they would obey God by killing the Canaanites.  The Old Testament traces the demise and destruction of Canaan.  Hid descendants were obliterated and it is tied into this event.  This provides a requirement for an adult son toward his father and offers a loving warning from God.

The story reminds me of the Old Testament proverb (Proverbs 30:17):

The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it.

God prohibits mockery of parents by a child and as we see in the case of Ham, this includes especially adult children.  Ham was a saved son.  The implication was, and many commentators agree, that Canaan was not a believer.  The demise of Ham's descendants, their annihilation related to his disrespect of his dad, even when his dad wasn't behaving in one of his better moments.  A responsibility lies on the son.  He's held responsible.  Whatever Noah did at the moment wasn't an excuse for Ham.

The interaction in the story in Genesis 9 is between an adult son with his father.  Hear the next few verses:

24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him. 25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. 26 And he said, Blessed be the LORD God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant. 27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant.

Noah takes charge with his adult sons.  He doesn't "let it go."  There isn't a pattern of letting things go, especially with a believing son like Ham.  Noah could have just blamed himself and did nothing.  He did wrong, but that didn't excuse his son from wrong.  Noah still stepped in.  Parents have to do that with their adult children.  That is the pattern through all of scripture.

Noah punishes one child and deals in a blessed way with the others.  The comparison is stark.  He made it known that not everyone would get the same treatment.  He wasn't concerned that Ham could become jealous.  This was a just judgment by Noah.  Just judgment is the way of God.  If Ham couldn't accept it, then he wasn't repentant and a far worse outcome awaited him.  This is akin, although not identical, to Paul teaching the Corinthians church to turning someone over to the devil that he might be saved.  Being saved, the long term result, is far better than short term niceties for the sake of getting along.

The story in Genesis 9 is pivotal.  It is monumental.  This event was cherry picked from hundreds of years.  This is what God wanted us to know.  It is ignored at our own peril.