Alien at home 2

Ever got to the end of a conversation about the gospel with a friend and thought: 'Well, I made a right pig's ear of that!'

In a society that is both ignorant of and hostile to Christianity, it can feel hard to explain God's truth to an unbeliever. You might fear you came over too aggressively or that you put things badly. You might wonder if you have put the friend off for good or made them more confused than ever. There are so many reasons why you can feel you got it wrong.

Try and share the gospel with non-Christian parents, however, and these worries multiply tenfold. After all, while your friends might be fooled into thinking you are quite a nice person, your parents know your worst faults - your grumpiness in the morning, the way you leave wet towels on the bedroom floor. This may make you fear that they won't even begin to listen or will simply discount anything you have to say. As one person put it: 'It is ... easier for them than others to find fault and for them to point out that some of their behaviour is more "Christian" than mine.'

Relationship upside down?

Not only that, it can feel all wrong to take on the mantle of teaching your parents something, especially something that you hold to be God's timeless truth that everyone should accept. This instructive role has historically been theirs: since your childhood it is they who have sought to inform your views on behaviour, morals, politics or whatever. To suddenly attempt to challenge your parents' thinking - and challenge it at the deepest level - can feel extraordinarily hard. It can feel as though you are questioning how the relationship works - as though you, not they, are playing the role of the older, wiser authority figure. I've heard people say . . .

'I think it's rather difficult telling your parents that they've lived their lives in a totally wrong way ƒ it's hard as a parent hearing that kind of thing from the boy whose nappies you've changed!'

'They don't like me claiming I have found answers they haven't; seems like a role-reversal in parent-child relationship.'

Learning from mistakes

All this can leave Christians feeling that explaining the gospel to their unbelieving parents is a well-nigh-impossible task. As we reported last month, EN conducted a survey on what it is like to have non-Christian parents. Many who responded to it admitted that the tips they could offer on teaching them the Good News came out of a sense of having made rather a mess of it in the past!
'I was too forceful and ungracious as a new Christian in telling them the gospel and so it has been awkward ever since...'.

It is a relief to all of us that God is sovereign. His rescue of those who are his will not be hindered by our ham-fisted efforts! Nevertheless, as his ambassadors in this world it is useful to ask how we can serve him to the best in this area. This month, in the second of our articles on unbelieving parents, we ask what the Bible teaches about how Christians should go about teaching them God's gospel.

When we ask about teaching your non-Christian parents the truth of the gospel we need to bear some basic principles in mind.

1. Remember respect

Last month we talked about the Bible's emphasis on honouring parents. It is a principle worth remembering when the Christian seeks to talk to his parents about God's truth. When we talk about something that is so important to us with the people who know us best, it is all too easy to become impolite, dismissive, irritated and argumentative. Our motivation may be good - we long desperately for our parents to understand and receive the gospel. However, our zeal needs to be tempered with a godly restraint if we are not to fall into the trap of forgetting the honour and respect our parents deserve from us.

Good questions to ask to ourselves as we share the gospel with parents are:

Am I listening to what they have to say?
Am I showing graciousness and respect - or am I being condescending, rude or patronising?
As we talk, am I aware of who they are: the ones who have done so much for me and whom he has called me to hold in esteem?

2. Don't just say it - live it

'I now realise how important it is to be "good news", rather than just preach it.'

Actions speak volumes - particularly with people who have known us all our lives. Christian offspring need to remind themselves constantly that, whether they are talking about the gospel, watching TV or eating a bag of chips, they are representatives of their heavenly Father. Being in the parental home is no excuse for laziness or selfish behaviour. How we live day-to-day is as vital to our Christian witness as what we say.

The case of Christian wives living with unbelieving husbands gives us an interesting point of comparison: 'Likewise, wives, be subject to your husbands, so that even if some of them do not obey the word, they may be won over without a word by the conduct of their wives - when they see your respectful and pure conduct' (1 Peter 3.1,2).

It is striking that Paul does not actively encourage wives married to non-Christians to tell their husbands the gospel. In fact he does the opposite. Rather than sharing tips on how to explain the Good News in the time it takes to eat breakfast, he tells wives to concentrate on their behaviour. 'Without a word' they should seek to model the gospel to their pagan husbands.

While the position of children in a family is in many ways different from that of a wife, surely some of what Peter says flows into that situation. Like the wife married to an unbeliever, they should have as their main focus godliness of life. This does not mean they should refrain from ever telling their parents the gospel, but they should not seek to blast their parents with it at every possible waking moment. Instead their priority will be to reflect this gospel in the way they live day-to-day as they love and respect their parents with thoughtfulness and grace. This will not feel or look very dynamic or revolutionary. However, it is a vital part of their evangelism - it is what God calls them to do as they seek to win over their parents to believe God's life-changing Word.

3. The power of prayer

In Colossians 4.2-4 Paul calls his readers to live out the gospel and be ready to speak when given the opportunity but he also stresses forcibly the need for them to do the work of prayer. Christian children also have this privileged responsibility in relation to their parents. Given the difficulties we have mentioned involved in children teaching their parents, one of the best prayers to pray is that parents would come into contact with the gospel in other areas of life. More generally, they can pray for their parents as they face the various experiences of life: that in them God would open their eyes to the pointlessness and folly of living life without him in charge. This work of prayer is vital; God promises in his Word that it is through our prayers that he works out his perfect will.

But what if they never become Christians?

'I know if God does not call him (my father) to faith then the judgement he will have will be fair and just. I think knowing this helps.'

The hardest thing for the Christian with unconverted parents is not knowing whether they will become Christians or whether they will leave this world rejecting Christ and facing certain judgement. When my own father died an unbeliever 12 years ago it caused me enormous pain and emotional turmoil. It also forced me to face, with my heart as well as my head, the realities about God and man. While I might have wished to question why my father remained unrepentant and why God did not seem to have chosen him, the fact was that, as far as I could tell, this hadn't happened. Either I got angry and railed against God - or I accepted the Bible's clear teaching about God's faithfulness and man's sin. The Bible assured me that God was both completely just and totally gracious and could be trusted to do what was right. Meanwhile, man, left to himself, sinfully rejects God and is deserving of his judgement. I had to accept that this was true, not just as a general principle, but true specifically for my father. While that led to many tears and sleepless nights, over time I found I was able to trust God and leave my father in his hands. In fact, I have to confess that while it was one of the most painful periods I've been through, it was at the same time very precious in the way God used it to make the truths of the gospel, life and eternity more real to me than ever before.

Next month EN looks at the whole issue of having unbelieving parents from a positive angle. What's good about it and what have those in this situation got to praise God for?

How to tell non-Christian parents the gospel

Relationship upside down?

Learning from mistakes

1. Remember respect

2. Don't just say it - live it

3. The power of prayer

But what if they never become Christians?

Elisa Beynon

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