Love and example have the power to rescue a child. But coupled with these virtues is the unequalled power of personal sanctification. When parents apply to increased righteousness, effectual keys are turned, and deliverance steps through the door. Here are two stories from parents: one in the process, and the other feeling the sweet fruits of success.

Dear Larry,

Thank you for letting me vent.

We have a son who is almost forty. When he was a teenager, he started playing in a rock band, and then he got into drugs. He married then lost his family. His friends have all moved on. Worst of all, he has lost our trust. We have spent thousands on his broken promises. I won’t go into all that has happened. He has hurt my husband and me and each of his siblings.

I am ashamed to admit that we have almost given up on him, and yet we continue to pray for him and hope for a miracle like unto Alma the Younger. His current girlfriend, who has also been on drugs, and her children want to change and join the Church. Their desire, the girlfriend says, is due to our examples. They want to be part of our family, but our son is jealous of their attention to us, and he will not support their decision.

I understand a little about the alcoholic mind. I am an ex-alcoholic. But with God’s help. I am past that problem, and I keep my temple covenants. The gospel gives me strength. I just wish I could convince my son that tou can do anything with the Lord on your side. Thanks for your articles.

Venting Mom

Dear Venting Mom,
Isn’t it wonderful that God never gives up on any of us? Obviously, he found you and saved you miraculously. He is certainly capable of doing the same for your son and his girlfriend. Your working with him is teaching you the next skill on the path to exaltation: how to become a savior on Mount Zion. Because gaining the skill of redemption is what we want, God is giving us invaluable training in mortality. 

Your situation is not curse; it is a trust. If you had been called to be the Young Women’s president, and had several girls who were wayward, you would be concerned, but you would not take their choice of waywardness personally. You would realize that you had been called of God at this very time for this very situation–it is a trust. Because you would have that perspective, although you might feel overwhelmed, you would know that Heavenly Father prepares and qualifies those whom he calls. Knowing that you are participating in his plan of salvation for these girls, rather than having to invent a plan of salvation, would give you the courage to move forward. Now you would know that sanctifying yourself so that you would have increased spiritual power is the key to working with these girls. 

Parents should feel the same way. We have a trust; we were prepared for and will be strengthened to accomplish that trust. We don’t have to create a plan; we simply need to increase our spiritual capacity to better participate in God’s plan, as he reveals it to us. Here is our mantra: Every effort we put forth to sanctify ourselves has a redeeming effect on those for whom we are praying. Despite your misgivings, you are probably doing better than you think, and changes might be happening in your son that you do not readily perceive. I suggest that you try praying with a specific purpose, then infuse spiritual power into those prayers by increasing your personal sanctification (more temple attendance, fasting, service, etc.). The specific purpose is to ask for in prayer is a “conversion opportunity” to be presented to your son. Don’t dictate the terms, but ask for something to happen that gives your son a chance to rethink his position and hopefully choose otherwise. Be patient and persistent then see what happens.

Thanks for writing to me.

Larry

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Dear Larry,
You asked for stories. Here is ours.

Beth (name changed) is the fifth of our six children. When I was pregnant, the Spirit whispered to me that my husband and I were receiving her from the Lord for a reason. She needed “seasoned parents.” When I was two months along, I sensed that this girl was going to be feisty. I was not disappointed.

When Beth was four years old, I was trying to teach her some simple chores. With an attitude, she put her little hands on her hips and said, “Mom, I wasn’t made for work!” That gave me a hint about what I was in for. On Sunday, when she was eleven, she was walking the halls of Primary, and suddenly she turned to me and said she didn’t want to go to the celestial kingdom. She said that when she turned eighteen she was going to move out and never be a Mormon again. She was good for her word. She was lees active throughout her teenage years. She began using self-destructive talk, and we tried to take her to a counselor, but she refused.

When she turned nineteen, she moved out, and by that time, it was a blessing for all of us. Actually, being on her own helped her in some ways. Nevertheless, many of her choices hurt us badly. Through it all, my husband and I focused our attention on maintaining a good relationship with her. I drew strength from the Book of Mormon, which acted like a Liahona in my life, telling me the next step in our relationship. The wonderful book helped me to change my attitude toward Beth. I no longer saw her as a problem child, but rather a wonderful gift that brought me closer to God. Beth began meeting guy on the Internet, which scared my husband and me. Eventually, she met a man not of our faith who truly loved her, and they married.

Now comes the miracle. A few years ago, in a Conference talk, an apostle promised senior couples that if they would serve a mission, their wayward children would be blessed. My husband and I accepted that challenge, and we served a mission. While we were gone, Beth was trying to conceive but without success. It was doubtful anyway. During all her promiscuous years, when she seldom took precautions, she never got pregnant. Now she wanted a baby, but nothing was happening. Until the month after we had left on our mission! Suddenly, Beth had a reason to stop drinking and smoking. Her husband stopped, too. She stopped drinking coffee and other caffeine drinks-all because of the baby.

After the child was born, he doctor prescribed heavy-duty pain killers, and she became addicted. Ne night, she called us in distress. She wanted us to help her get in touch with the bishop because she was “sick” and wanted a blessing. She had not slept in four days, and her life was unraveling. This opened a door. Over the next few weeks, while she was detoxing, she read the Book of Mormon and prayed. These were the only things that helped her get through the ordeal.

Within a month, she read the entire Book of Mormon. She would call us with insightful questions, which proved that she was really absorbing the message. The she read The Miracle of Forgiveness and the Doctrine and Covenants. Now she is working on the Old and New Testaments. She continues to meet with the bishop, and she and her husband are attending church. HE is even taking the missionary lessons!

My husband and I returned from our mission recently. Beth and her husband continue to go to church. We can’t believe the miracle that is happening right before our eyes. But when I hear the cheerfulness in Beth’s voice, it makes the last thirteen years of fasting, praying and serving a mission worth the price. Recently she told us, “Mom and Dad, you taught me right. It just took a little longer to sink in.”

I appreciate your saying in your article that the evil one knows who to attack-our young and vulnerable ones. Beth’s patriarchal blessing says just that: because of her valiance in the defense of agency in the premortal existence, Satan would single her out and try to destroy her. The subject of agency has always been important to her, but it just took awhile for her to exercise agency correctly.

I can testify that God is a God of miracles, and he keeps his promises…on his time schedule.

A mother who witnessed a miracle

Have you ever become so frustrated with your wayward child that you wish something difficult would happen to shake him up? Then you repent and go back to status quo. But what if your prayer was to ask for a conversion experience-something that would offer the child an opportunity to rethink his position and exercise his agency in a positive way?

Here are two stories from parents: one who is in the process of rescuing her wayward children, and another who prayed for an accident!

Dear Larry,

I’ve been happily reading your articles on Meridian Magazine.  I even printed a couple of them and studied and pondered.  Because of what I read, I began praying for my children and for opportunities to let them feel my love, preparatory to praying for conversion opportunities.  I have three adult sons–one died by suicide 17 years ago–so lots of pain in the parenting world for me!  And I have three adult daughters, and a twelve-year-old daughter. 

Our family is not only broken, it is fractured. I had “accepted’ that my adult children had made their choices to not be involved with the gospel, and I threw all my attention on raising the youngest. Then her father began to fight me for custody of her. During the struggle, I prayed mightily and was blessed with success, but ALSO the spirit whispered to me that I do have other children, who still need my love and attention. 

It was right then that I saw your articles on Meridian and realized that my parenting responsibilities are not over. There ARE things I can do! So I began to pray mightily for them, praying for opportunities to show my love for them (let’s start small!).  Last night, as I lay in bed, I realized that a miracle had occurred during that day: I had enjoyed ‘heart to heart’ talks with two of my adult daughters and another wonderful conversation with my youngest. All in one day!  The Lord had answered my prayers for “conversion opportunities!” He had quietly opened the door for me to show my love. 

I am working on strengthening myself spiritually, and praying more fervently for more opportunities to reach out to my children. I had given up, but now I realize that I can pray and sanctify myself, and the Lord will bless and help me. I realize that my children their agency, but I also have learned that I can pray and ask the Lord to bless them with opportunities to use their agency to rethink their position. And maybe it all starts with love and healing the relationship. Please tell your readers that we mothers should never underestimate the power of our love. That power can make us an instrument in the hands of the Lord in the lives of our children.

Thank you so much for opening my eyes!

Mom whose eyes were opened

Dear Mom Whose Eyes Were Opened,

You have made an important discovery: Love is the greatest power in the universe.

When we work with our wayward children, we must remember that we can no more change a person than a missionary can convert. Change and conversion are the Holy Ghost’s job. But sadly, often when we parents are faced with a challenge that only a god could tackle, we feel overwhelmed and alone. Actually, divine help rushes to our aid, as you have learned. Our object should be to infuse spiritual power into our lives so we can better participate in God’s plan of salvation for our child. As we do so, we make another discovery: Every effort we make to sanctify ourselves has a redeeming effect on the person for whom we are praying. When we make that discovery, we have learned one of the most valuable lessons in mortality–one that will follow us into eternity and fit us to become eternal parents, who will be doing the work of redemption forever.

Keep loving and praying. Things will turn out better than you can imagine.

Blessings!

Larry

Dear Larry,

I am a mother to six children, all of them are now grown and most are struggling. One of my sons came home after serving nine months of his mission. He was determined to repent of his sins, but found it harder than he had anticipated. His prison term is nearing an end, and I have observed in him the desire to repent and change his life. I know that this will take time, but hopefully he will be fully converted to the gospel. 

Another son returned from serving an honorable mission and served faithfully in various church callings until abruptly he changed his entire lifestyle within six months. He tells me that he knows that the gospel is true, but he can no longer live it as he was taught. Now he has chosen an alternate lifestyle.  Another son was a victim of abuse as a young child. He says the gospel is true, but living the commandments is too hard. He has also chosen an alternate lifestyle and questions why our church won’t accept it.

 I’m not exactly sure what I would like to say, but after reading several of your articles in the Meridian Magazine, I felt I needed to thank you for the view that you have opened up for me.  Hope has been dim for a long time, but now I realize that I should not have let it disappear in my life. I am learning to not give up. I feel a great chasm in my family. We are being split apart by our individual understandings of the gospel. It seems that each of us is standing on a different side of the bank, and as the chasm widens we drift farther apart.

I struggle to not dwell on mourning the choices of my sons. I try to receive strength and courage from the scriptures, and I strive to follow the examples of Lehi, Alma the Elder, and others as they relate how they dealt with their wayward children. Reading your articles has helped me to redouble my hold on the iron rod. I realize that I must endeavor to live the gospel as best I can, and continue to pray and hope that my children will eventually turn and seek the gospel with all their hearts. Again, thank you for your articles which give me hope and strength.

Hopeful Mother