Shaping the Next Generation

In this inspiring talk, Dr. Crawford Loritts shares how all of us—whether parents or not—can play a part in shaping the next generation by living out our faith, being real about repentance, and leaving a legacy that points to Jesus.

Have you thought about the kind of parent you want to be?

What about the kind of friend you want to be?

What kind of impact you want to have on the world around you?

No matter where you are in life today—whether you're a college student, young professional, single, dating, or especially if you have young children—lean in and learn from Dr. Loritts's wisdom on the purpose and mission of the family. Take note of the practical investments parents can make to leave a lasting impact on the generations that follow.

The Purpose and Mission of the Family

Consider this: the family should be a testament to the Trinitarian love and community that exist in Heaven. The relationship between God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit is perfect, and the family is meant to model that kind of love here on Earth in two powerful ways:

1. Modeling Divine Love: Families should reflect the love and unity of the Trinity, offering a small window into divine relationships within human history.
2. Stewarding God's Image: Families are tasked with passing down the history of God's character and faithfulness from one generation to the next, with the understanding that family is both mission and legacy.

The North Star: Character of God and Scripture

A family’s enduring legacy lies in its commitment to the character of God and the content of Scripture. Dr. Loritts emphasizes that our lives should serve as a visible biography of God's intervention, instilling a sense of divine history and purpose in future generations. All of us who have put our faith in Jesus are now part of the history of God's faithfulness that stretches back to creation itself!

Whether it's to your children, your friends, or the people around you, there are stories to tell—stories of God's faithfulness and his actions throughout history that will encourage, edify, and even equip them for whatever they are facing. So don't abandon these two principal tools in your toolbelt of influence, because not only will the people around you need them, but you will too, as you seek to move through life in a way that honors God and puts him on display in your world.

Investments in Parenting

Dr. Loritts shared seven investments that parents can make to influence the next generation effectively. As you walk through these practical reminders, remember that no one will get these right 100% of the time. The goal is to do your best with what you have been given. Some of these were modeled by your parents, and so maybe they come naturally to you. Some of these were not, and so you are blazing a new trail for your family. Give yourself grace and remember that when you inevitably miss the mark from day to day, the most powerful thing you can do is to be honest, confess, and repair whatever needs to be repaired. Now, let's get started:

1. Give Them a Picture of Your Own Vibrant/Authentic Walk with God: Parents need to visibly demonstrate their own relationship with God, as this is the foundation upon which children can build their faith. If we are not careful, it is so easy to slip into a hypocritical lifestyle; one where we are telling the people around us, even our children, how to live their lives while not living that way ourselves. Why would the people around us, even our children, want to talk to God, trust in God, or depend on God when they never see us doing those things? If you want to influence the people around you, it ultimately means that you want them to follow your lead, so ask yourself, how and where are you leading them?
2. Model Repentance and Forgiveness: Being humble enough to seek forgiveness and acknowledge mistakes fosters a genuine and intimate family dynamic. "Proud parents do not have intimate relationships with their children." In Dr. Loritts' story, he went so far as to go out of his way to find his son and apologize to him. Would you have done that? Have you? It can be easy to think that the people following us, especially our children, will just understand or forget our mistakes, but consider for a moment your own parents, teachers, leaders, or bosses. When they erred against you, did you just let it go or forget about it? How much more of an example of God's radical grace would it have been if they had circled back around it and taken the time to apologize to you and try to make things right? In our world today, humility is unbelievably rare, even among Jesus-followers, but if we want to truly demonstrate the love of the Father and the forgiveness we received through Jesus, we must be willing to set our pride aside and be repentant and forgiving people. Consider what Dr. Loritts' son had to say about this father decades later: "I remember my Dad's apologies more than I do his sins."
3. Keep in Mind, Legalistic Parents Don't Typically Raise Godly Children: Rigid expectations can lead to disillusionment. Instead, relate to children with grace, as none of us are perfect. There is a major difference between wanting the best from someone and wanting them to be perfect. Again, how can we be Jesus-minded people if we are only willing to extend grace towards ourselves and not others? Consider how God has been gracious to you, giving you clear boundaries of how to live, but also reaching towards you when you have crossed those lines time and time again. It is an honor to be entrusted to do the same with our children, be they spiritual or blood. Their life is their own, and we'll talk about this in a few points from now, but that means we have to be ready to let them explore and discover, and to be there to remind them (with grace) when they have strayed too far.
4. Give Them the Gift of Consequences: Allowing children to experience the results of their actions builds wisdom and character, counteracting tendencies toward entitlement and narcissism. The same is true for all of us, no matter our age. When human beings move through life devoid of consequences, we tend to be an unruly lot. How quickly does our attitude shift towards believing that we have done, and can do, no wrong? One writer of Proverbs calls this person a fool. Simply stated, a parent or mentor's role is to "raise no fools." Helping a person to see the consequences of their actions allows them to begin to understand that their life choices carry weight and repercussions. Just as God extends grace towards us when we fail, we should also do the same when our children fail. In fact, how we address their consequences is often just as important as the consequences themselves. This is true, Godly influence and leadership.
5. Incrementally Release Your Children: Gradually allow children to make their own decisions, encouraging independence and accountability. You cannot live your children's, friends', or mentees' lives for them, but it will be natural to want to. You'll want to protect them from pain, take control of the wheel and steer them around heartache, and hold them so tightly that not even the enemy's arrows can get to them. But what will this accomplish? When you are gone (and we all will be someday), what kind of character will they be left with? As difficult as it will be, you have to learn to raise them with releasing them in mind. Here's a sweet secret: watching your children learn something so completely that they learn to do it without you is a beautiful thing. God has a plan for your life, so don't be so set on trying to live everyone else's (even your children's) life that you miss out on it.
6. Make Your Children a Priority but Not an Idol: Children should be a priority, not the center of a parent's life. This isn't about devaluing your children but properly valuing God. It is so often the best things in our lives, the greatest gifts God has given us, that we tend to unconsciously promote above the gift-giver Himself. You would hardly be the first person to fall into this trap. Scripture is full of examples of human beings time and time again worshipping the gift over God. The problem is that your misordered hierarchy can have disastrous consequences when the gift is a person. Look back at the last five points! Each of these goes wrong when God is not properly placed as our paramount priority. You can't model a life dependent on God if your children rank above Him, nor can you set your pride aside and apologize to them without the forgiveness of God blowing up your own heart each and every day. Grace and wisdom come from God, so without Him, how would you extend either? And how could you begin to let the ones you love the most live their own lives without entrusting them to a good and faithful God? Work hard to get the order of priority right, with God at the top, your spouse (if you have one) next, and your children third, and you'll find that what you communicate to each of them through word and deed will fall into place.
7. Help Them Discover the "Signature" God has Written Over Their Souls: Guide children to understand God's unique plan for them, rather than imposing parental aspirations on them. It's one thing to want your child to maximize their potential, and it's another to try to supersede God's authority in their life by forcing them to adopt your plans instead of His. How beautiful it is to watch a believer come alive in Jesus, and then to discover that passion and purpose that sets their heart ablaze and honors God! Why, oh why, would we want to rob anyone of that journey? Because we care deeply about them and want to shield them from any missteps. But life is so rarely a straight line; it curves around gulleys and traverses rivers, it lumbers up hills and backtracks through deserts. It's how it was with your life, and it will be how it is with their lives. But that doesn't mean it's not Holy. When we embark on that great journey with Jesus, we aren't promised that life will be easy; in fact, we are promised that we will have troubles, but how wonderful it is to find the thing we were wired to do alongside the one who did the wiring? You can trust Jesus with your children, and you can trust Him with their future.

Radical Dependence on God

Dr. Loritts concludes with a powerful reminder: effective parenting begins with a deep dependence on God. Through prayer and humility, parents can seek the wisdom and strength necessary to guide their children. Can't you just hear his mother's prayers that he mentioned? Do you think that she didn't know her kids were there in the hallway? Didn't hear them come running by? And yet she didn't shy away from letting them hear her talk to Jesus on their behalf. There is so much power in that. Think about what we have said before, that if we knew what happened in Heaven when we prayed, we would never stop praying. You have direct access to God through prayer, and it is one of the holiest mysteries of our faith. What or who are you leveraging it for? If God answered all of your prayers today, would anyone else's life be different as a result, or just your own? Depend on your Heavenly Father and with His history of faithfulness in mind, trust in Him to continue to be faithful to the next generation, and the next, and the ones to come long after you are gone. Shaping the next generation takes a lifetime of intentionality and faith, echoing through each decision and behavior. By aligning your life with God’s purpose, you can set a divine course for your family, one that resonates for generations to come.