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Following is an excerpt of "Help For Hurting Parents (3 of 6)" by Stan Coffey added on 04/19/2004.
This content is part of a series.
Help for Hurting People (3 of 6)
Help For Hurting Parents
Stan Coffey
Luke 15:11-13

Today if you have your Bible I would like for you to turn to Luke chapter 15. And we are going to look at the familiar story of the prodigal son. I am going to speak today about "Help for Hurting Parents." We have been talking about help for hurting people, because we live in a world for hurting people. Most people are experiencing some kind of pain all the time, physical pain, emotional pain, or spiritual pain. There are all kinds of hurts that need to be healed and Jesus is the great healer. I think one group of people that hurts for so many reasons would be the parents or the grandparents who are here today because sometimes life's greatest hurts can come from the people who are nearest and dearest to you. Sometimes people of your own flesh and blood can be the cause of the greatest hurts that you experience in life. Our families, our spouse, our children, our relatives can sometimes be unkind or ungrateful or unfaithful. And when that happens, there is brokenness; there is a hurt that goes deep into the human spirit. And if you have experienced what I am talking about then you will identify with the father in this story whose son went astray. And went far away from his teaching and from the values that he had given to his son.

I want to say upfront that I am not an authority on parenting. My wife is working in the nursery so I am praising the Lord for that, that she is not here to hear this message. She would probably want to get up and preach one when I get through. But I kind of feel like Charles Shed when he said how he felt when he preached on parenting as a single person. He had a talk he gave, "How To Raise Your Children." And then after he got married he changed the title to "Some Suggestions For Parents." Then after his first child was born, he changed it to "Feeble Hints For Fellow Strugglers." And then after he had three children he stopped giving the talk all together! It is kind of like the lady who jumped on the bus one day. She had five kids with her and the bus driver said, are those your kids or is this a picnic? She said these are my kids and it ain't no picnic! A lot of you parents know what I mean.

Like the little boy who went to school and they asked his mother did Billy cry when you took him to school. She said, no but the teacher did. And some of you teachers could identify with that. And I am not an authority, but God is an authority and the Lord is the one who has the answers.

And one of the things that has always been difficult to understand, one thing that is difficult to explain and yet I found it to be a reality, see if you agree with me. And that is, that even godly parents have children who go astray. I have even seen in many cases, children who grow up under the same parents, with the same teaching, the same church, the same Sunday School teachers, and the same environment and yet chi ...

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