My son or daughter is an Atheist Now – What Should i really do?

Reflections upon Love, Intercourse, Religion and Tech

Where do you turn whenever your daughter or son informs you they’ve stopped believing in Jesus?

As a paternalfather of five, I’m able to empathize in the event that you’ve recently discovered your youngster has kept the Christian faith. Last year, my earliest son told us which he ended up being now an atheist. It had been gut wrenching. It sooner or later delivered me personally on a long journey with my very own faith when I experimented with win my son’s faith straight back.

With hindsight and experience, I’d want to share some advice.

I want to be up-front with my visitors if you arrived to my post from a Google search. I happened to be a deeply committed Christian good grief for almost 35 years. Myself a Christian, the advice I give below is sincere and heartfelt while I no longer call. I am hoping you’ll still read the things I need to share, but i’ve added this note me to be up-front with my readers because it’s important to.

First, recognize that intense feeling can feel all-consuming. Initially, you don’t also desire to think your daughter or son has kept the faith. Similar to with a grief that is major a reaction of denial is normal. From the planning to reject all of it for a time.

“It’s simply a period. He’ll grow from the jawhorse. Jesus gets a hold of his heart and change his head.”

You will probably feel just like you’ve unsuccessful miserably as a moms and dad. In addition, i recall simply planning to shake him making sure that their sensory faculties would get back (the anger period). I’m glad that i did son’t yell, scream or get real. It’s understandable if you yelled. Numerous do. Just a parent understands exactly what sacrificial love for your child feels as though. You need to protect them. You prefer the finest for them.

It could be beneficial to recognize that you will probably have the other phases which can be normal with grief, including bargaining, despair not only that, acceptance.

Just what exactly should you are doing? What are the answers that are easy? If only there have been.

Listed here might be difficult to read but please hear me away. Let’s focus on what you ought ton’t do and then we’ll look at steps you can take.

• Don’t yell, scream or insult them. Yelling “How can you be therefore stupid.” is not likely to be effective. It’s a proper hindrance to using an open discussion. In the event that you got annoyed, please do whatever is essential to bring back an connection that is open your youngster.
• Ask, but don’t assume which they should just read their Bible more. I’ve discovered that many atheists understand the Bible much better than many Christians. There are numerous atheists whom actually reached non-belief from doing exactly that — reading the whole Bible. The Old Testament is particularly an issue. In the event that you’ve ever read it, you understand there are a great number of unpleasant things in there: slavery endorsed by God; genocide commanded by God; plural wedding; allowance for raping a lady after which marrying her; strange commandments about maybe not blending materials, etc. The Bible contains numerous amazing tales and parables of love and mercy, but from a logical viewpoint, it is maybe not difficult to understand why some body might reject the Bible after close scrutiny.
• Carefully think about before demanding they attend church every right time that the doorways are available. “That’s it! We’re going to church every Sunday and Wednesday to any extent further.” I’m assuming your kid is a teenager or adult that is young of course therefore, understand that the outcome of the coercion will soon be resentment and bitterness from your own daughter or son. If for example the daughter or son would like to go to, great. But attendance that is forcing create significant resentment, producing a brick wall surface to hearing any message. Suicidal idea is a potential result.
• Don’t assume they neglected to enough pray hard. Possibly just like me, you’ve invested a lot of time on the knees over time. We need to acknowledge that prayer is unfortuitously, a conversation that is one-sided. Prayer is reassuring! But be empathetic to all those who have invested energy that is significant God’s nevertheless tiny vocals but whom never heard an answer.
• Be cautious of threatening these with hell fire and damnation. It eventually ends up sounding just like the kind of thing that an abusive fan would say: “Love me or I’ll destroy you!” Atheists don’t rely on hell. It’s a doctrine that developed as time passes. You might want to expect you’ll hear a number of the typical arguments or concerns against the doctrine of hell. This consists of: Why would a loving God use a threat (hell) to motivate a relationship with him?If Jesus may be the composer of love, exactly how could a compassionate, nurturing Father send their offspring into eternal torment? Why would a loving Jesus that is omniscient — why would He produce humans them suffer in a lake of fire, forever and ever that he knows will reject Him, and then let? Therefore once again, be mindful of utilizing the risk of hell as an instrument to coerce.