Grandparents in the Gap

5/16/10 | Richard Van Dyke | II Timothy 1:5 | Listen
Series: Hope For Your Home

Let me share some humorous and touching comments about grandparents.

What children need most are the essentials that grandparents provide in abundance. They give unconditional love, kindness, patience, humor, comfort, lessons in life and most importantly, cookies. ~Rudolph Giuliani

An hour with your grandchildren can make you feel young again. Anything longer than that, and you start to age quickly. ~Gene Perret

A grandmother is a little bit parent, a little bit teacher, and a little bit best friend. ~Author Unknown

Becoming a grandmother is wonderful. One moment you're just a mother. The next you are all-wise and prehistoric. ~Pam Brown

Grandchildren don't stay young forever, which is good because Grandpas have only so many horsey rides in them. ~Gene Perret

One of the most powerful handclasps is that of a new grand baby around the finger of a grandfather. ~Joy Hargrove

A child needs a grandparent, anybody's grandparent, to grow a little more securely into an unfamiliar world. ~Charles and Ann Morse

Grandparenting is far more challenging than it was a generation ago with 5.5 million parenting their grandchildren. With these challenges and many more, we want to look at some biblical principles for grandparenting and see how you as a grandparent can leave a legacy.

There are only a couple of verses in the Bible specifically mentioning grandparents and one is II Timothy 1:5 relating to Timothy's mother and grandmother. What do we know about this grandmother named Lois? We know that:

1. She along with her daughter Eunice was a believer in Jesus.

2. She had a sincere faith. The word sincere means real, not hypocritical. It was "at home" with her.

3. She taught the Word and handed off her faith to her children (II Timothy 3:14 & 15)

Someone has well stated, “Our true epitaphs will not be carved in stone. They will be carved in the souls and memories of our children...of our grandsons and granddaughters. Regardless of what someone someday chooses to write about us on our tombstones, those words can never overwrite what we were. God leaves the last word on our lives to those we leave behind. We are all writing the epitaphs of our life on the hearts of our children and grandchildren. They will sum up our lives some day. And that sum total will have a deep and abiding effect on the lives that they end up leading.”

Gordon MacDonald said that he wants to grow older with the wholehearted energy and faith of Caleb.

While the Bible never calls Caleb a grandparent, my guess is that at 85 years old (Joshua 14:10) he probably was one and there are some things that can be gleaned from his life as well.

1. He had a strong faith in God (Numbers 13:30; Joshua 14:14)

2. He believed God's promises (Joshua 14:10-12)

There are perhaps two other passages that focus on grandparents-Psalms 71& 92. Let's spend a few minutes in those Psalms. John Piper said that he wants to be an old man characterized by faith like that of the writer of Psalm 71.

1. Psalms 71:5, 6, 9, 14, 17 and 18 address the psalmists past, present, and future.

a. The past-verses 5, 6, and 17a. Notice that it's never too early to teach children and grandchildren

b. the present-verses 17b

c. the future-verses 9 & 18

The word "declare" in verses 17 & 18 emphasizes 3 things

1. a person who witnesses something and tells others about it

2. a person who reports a life or death matter

3. a person who explains something to someone who lacks knowledge of it

2. Psalm 92:12-15 emphasizes that fact that the righteous will still bear fruit in their old age.

If God challenges grandparents in these verses to leave a legacy, what is involved in that? Let me suggest 6 ways we might do that. I'm indebted for some of this information to Focus on the Family and Home Word with Jim Burns.

1. Love them. While children may seem smarter and sharper than we were, they still have the same need to be loved, especially if they don't receive much of it in their home. This doesn’t involve buying expensive gifts; they just need your presence and involvement in their lives and activities.

2. Listen to them. Make your home and yourself a place that's safe where they can think out loud and question, where they can share hurts, frustrations, disappointments and joys.

3. Set a standard for them, a standard of moral living in an immoral world. You can accomplish this in 4 ways:

a. Show them consistent integrity.

b. Demonstrate personal discipline in an age of instant gratification

c. Help them learn endurance, an ability to persevere

d. Demonstrate a contagious faith. Tell them how your faith has changed and grown.

4. Provide a library of memories (Psalms 78:2-4, 6) God gives grandparents another chance to teach important lessons through reading and story-telling. The lyrics of an African folk song say that when an older person dies, it’s as if a library has burned down.

5. Model and talk about faith and character and pray for them.

6. Give them a blessing. Rob Rienow suggests that a blessing creates security and peace in the hearts of our children and grandchildren.

“One of the things that our Heavenly Father does throughout Scripture is to give blessings to His children. Right after God created Adam and Eve, He blessed them. When God blesses us He is saying, "I wish this for you. I give this to you. I desire this for you." God has given the power of blessing to parents and grandparents. Taking the time to bless our children with words of prayer and affirmation can transform their lives.”

“My mother blessed me every day when I left for school. She would meet me at the side door, put her arm around me, and speak the words of blessing from Numbers 6:24-26.

The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”

Gary Smalley and John Trent wrote a book titled The Blessing in which they suggest a blessing consists of 5 parts:

1. Meaningful touch

2. A spoken message

3. Attach high value to the one being blessed

4. Picture a special future

5. Make an active commitment

We have wonderful opportunities as grandparents to leave a legacy. If we fail to buy up those opportunities, there could be rather tragic consequences for the next generation. Judges 2:10 says, "And all that generation were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel."