This summer some of you grandparents will be vacationing with your grandchildren. It’s a great way to spend some extra time with them and enjoy some quality interaction.  I would like you to imagine you are camping with your grandchildren in the mountains. You’ve cooked your dinner over the fire and now you are relaxing around the campfire beside a big lake. It is perfectly still, there is no wind. The lake looks like a mirror reflecting a beautiful sunset. You are roasting marshmallows and eating s’mores while the grand kids are also throwing rocks in the lake. They are enthralled with the ripples they are making in the water, having a great time trying to see who can make the biggest ripples.

Grandpa tells grandma, “Just as the kids are making ripples in the water with the rocks we can make ripples in the lives of our grandchildren with our prayers”.  Our prayers for our grandchildren to invite Jesus Christ into other lives and walk with Him throughout their lives will have a ripple effect to their families, friends, their world, and their future.

Another way, we as grandparents can have a ripple effect on our grandchildren is the way we live our lives. As we seek the Lord ourselves and invest time, energy, and effort in our own walk with the Lord, we will have a ripple effect on our children, grandchildren, and future generations.

I found a letter in my family archives written by my great-grandfather in Poland to my grandfather who had immigrated to America. In the letter, he wrote that he was praying for my grandfather and his future generations. What a blessing it was for me to see in writing that my great-grandfather had prayed for me before I was born.  His prayers had a ripple effect on my life.  Prayer is the greatest gift we can give our family. Material things are needed but they are temporary. Our prayers can affect them for a lifetime.

As grandparents, let’s deliberately pray and pass our love for God on to our children and grandchildren and watch the ripple effect, just as our grandkids enjoy the ripple effect from the rocks they throw into the water.

As the verse in Proverbs tell us, when we walk with the Lord and follow his ways, we will enjoy the fruit of our labors and our lives will be rich. We may not see the answers to our prayers during our lifetime but they will be in God’s storehouse and have a ripple effect.

Next month I will introduce you to “Grandparents At Prayer”, a new intercessory prayer ministry for Christian Grandparenting Network to help you pray more intentionally for your grandchildren.

© 2009 Lillian Penner

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