PARTICIPATING IN THE SINS OF YOUR ADULT CHILD

PARTICIPATING IN THE SINS OF YOUR ADULT CHILD
How long are you going to turn a blind eye to your adult children and grandchildren’s fornication while living under your roof and spinelessly withhold the truth because you do not want to jeopardize your relationship with them?
Why are you minimizing their sin and softening the consequences of their sinful choices?
Why haven’t you taken a stand for righteousness and told them their sexual immorality has far-reaching negative consequences in this life and puts them in danger of God’s wrath against sin and eternal damnation in the next one?
Why haven’t you told them that they need to arrange other accommodations?
What kind of example are you setting with your cowardly capitulation, compromise, and silence rather than speaking out for the honor of God?
How many years of witnessing to your unsaved children, friends, and family members have you irretrievably loss?
As a follower of Christ, you have the responsibility of setting godly boundaries with your adult children. You may not have control over their choices, but you have control over whether or not you will be a partaker in their sin (Ephesians 5:6-7). Allowing them to stay under your roof with their "significant other" is enabling their sin of sexual immorality! (1st Cor. 6:9-10) Not only are you to resist sin in your own life, but you are not to approve and enable those who indulge in it in order to be seen as tolerant or to avoid conflict.
1 Samuel 3:13 reads, "for I (God) have told him (Eli, the high priest) that I will judge his house forever for the iniquity which he knows because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not." These words were spoken by God to the prophet Samuel, who had to tell Eli that God was going to bring judgment against him and his entire house.
Eli had warned his sons about their fornication with women and treating the offerings of the Lord with vile contempt, but he allowed them to go on in their sin instead of effectively stopping their wickedness and setting a godly example to the nation of Israel. It is most likely that Eli felt if he removed them from their position as priests, it would lead to family estrangement.
Eli had neglected to instruct and correct his children while they were sheltered under his parental roof. When they became adults, he confronted them and warned them they were sinning against God, most likely because their behavior had become public knowledge. However, by allowing them to continue to minister as priests, Eli was sending the message that their sinful behavior was not that big a deal. God expected Eli to do more than just merely rebuke them. He expected Eli to have the moral courage to do what he knew was right ….. to stop them, and when he did not, he became a partaker of their sins because he tolerated their shameless behavior. As a partaker of his children’s sin, he became a partaker of their punishment as well.
God tells Eli in 1st Samuel 2:31, “The time is coming when I will put an end to your family, so it will no longer serve as my priests. All the members of your family will die before their time. None will reach old age.” The terrible consequences that came upon Eli and his family because he honored his sons more than he honored God should be a warning to every parent (1 Samuel 2:29).
Ephesians 5:6-8 warns us: “Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of such things God’s wrath comes on those who are disobedient. Therefore, do not be partners with them (in their sin.). For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light…” Because your unsaved or backslidden adult child has made poor choices does not mean you should do the same.

By Lynette Hughes