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When You Regret How You Parented Your Kids · Daily Devotions for Busy Lives

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Bart Leger: By the time Christina Lemur was grown, the
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distance between her and her father was just a fact of her
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life. Whatever had gone wrong in the raising of her had hardened
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into the way things were. She wasn't waiting for it to change,
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and she'd stopped expecting anything different from him.
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Then, later in his life, her father did something she hadn't
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seen coming. He brought it up himself. He started to say he
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was sorry for the past and for how he'd been. We'll come back
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to what she did with that, but first,
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welcome to Daily Devotions for Busy Lives. I'm Bart Leger. I've
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had this conversation with more parents than I can count.
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Somebody reaches a certain age and starts thinking about their
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regrets during their parenting years. They were too or not
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strict enough. They missed too much of it. They said a thing at
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a dinner table years ago that their grown daughter still
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brings up, and every time I hear a parent doing that, I end up
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doing my own inventory because I have a list too. have one is not
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looking closely enough. A lot of parents get to a point where
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they look back at 20 years of raising kids and see things they
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would have done differently. You were more critical than you
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needed to be. Maybe you said things you can't unsay. Maybe
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you worked through years when you should have been there at
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the table, and now they're grown. The window for changing how you
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did it closed while you weren't even watching. You can't go back
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and be a gentler father or a more caring mother to a
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nine-year-old who is 34 now. So you just live with a regret.
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There's a verse about God as a father that I want you to hear
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from the parents' side of it. Psalm 103, 13 and 14.
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Look at the reason the verse gives for the compassion. He
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remembers we are only dust. God's tenderness toward you is
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tied to what he knows about the material he's working with. He
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made you. And he knows what we're parenting through. He also
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knows what your own father handed you to work with when you
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started. He's not grading you against some other parent who
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had more sleep and more help than you had. He knows what you
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were working with because he watched you do it. So bring him
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the regret. It's welcome at the throne of grace. The verse says
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he is tender toward the people who fear him. And tender is a
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strange word for God until the day you need it. A father who
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remembers your dust doesn't flinch when you tell him what
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you got wrong. And here's where this turns. You still have a
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relationship with these people. They are adults now and adults
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can be talked to. You get to be a different kind of parent to
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them starting this month. You can go to your grown son or
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daughter and admit your regrets. You can say, I was harder on you
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than I should have been. And I've thought about it for years.
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You don't need a speech for that. And you don't need them to take
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it well. And Christina didn't quite know what to do with it.
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The apology didn't erase the years or tie the past up neatly.
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Things were just too complicated for that. But her father had
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done the part that was his to do. He went first. He admitted his
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part without waiting for her to make it easy. And that gave her
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something to start with. She found she could take a step
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toward him also. The repair began in adulthood, years after
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childhood was over because one parent decided it wasn't too
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late to try. Look at what her father did with the last stretch
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of his life. He went first. And nothing was forcing him to. He
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didn't wait for her to meet him partway or for her to make it
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comfortable for him. The years stayed exactly what they were.
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And the two of them still found somewhere to start. That's the
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part you have access to today. And here's today's challenge.
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Take the thing you keep replaying and say it out loud to
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God first. Tell him the specific version of it. The afternoon or
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the sentence you keep coming back to. He already knows. And
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saying it moves it out of your head and into his hands. Then
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send your grown child a message with one line of it in there or
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call them. I have been thinking about how I handled some things
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when you were younger, and I know I've got parts of it wrong,
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or maybe much of it. That's the whole message. Leave off the
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request for a response and then leave the rest up to God. Father,
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you call yourself tender and compassionate. And you say the
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reason is that you remember we're dust. Thank you for that.
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For every parent listening who is going back through years they
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can't get back, meet them with tenderness that you promised.
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Give them the courage to say what needs to be said to a grown
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child this week and do what only you can do in the room that
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opens up after they say it. In Jesus' name, amen. episode
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encouraged you today, would you share it with someone who might
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need to hear it? Just go to DailyDevotionsForBusyLives.com
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slash 327 and copy the link. It only takes a second, and it
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might make a real difference in someone's day. Thanks for
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joining me on Daily Devotions for Busy Lives. Remember, God
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remembers that you're dust, and he is tender about it. Bring him
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the regret, and then say one sentence to your kid. Come back
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next time for more encouragement to help you live grounded in
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God's truth. Until then, God bless, and have a great day.