Ripple Effect of Praying Grandparents

Happy are those who fear the Lord— who follow his ways! Will enjoy the fruit of your labor! How happy you will be! How rich your life. Psalm 128:1,2 (N LT)

 This summer, some grandparents will be vacationing with their grandchildren. It’s a great time to spend extra time with them and interact with them. Multi Generation Family Camping Together

I would like for you to imagine camping with your grandchildren in the mountains. You’ve cooked your dinner over the fire and 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 grandkids are also throwing rocks in the lake. They are enthralled with the ripples they make in the water, having a great time trying to see who can make the biggest ones. 

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 ripple and affect their families, friends, world, and future.

Another way we as grandparents can have a ripple effect on our grandchildren is how we live our lives. If we seek the Lord ourselves and invest time, energy, and effort in our 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 future generations. What a blessing it was 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. 

Just as the verse in Psalms tells 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. 

Lillian Penner is the author of Grandparenting with a Purpose: Effective Ways to Pray for Your Grandchildren in English and Spanish. It will challenge you and give you more creative ideas to pray intentionally for your grandchildren. She is on staff with the Christian Grandparenting Network prayer ministry, developing prayer cards, grandparents@Prayer groups, and the Grandparenting Day of Prayer. She has a passion for praying intentionally for her grandchildren and desires to share that passion with other grandparents. An avid blogger, Lillian breaks into smiles if you ask about her thirteen grandchildren and five great-grandchildren. She and her husband, John, live in Portland, Oregon, where they are active in church ministries. They were both raised in Christian homes and desire to pass their godly heritage to their future generations. She and her husband enjoy traveling, Southern Gospel music but most of all, enjoy spending time with their family.

Feature Photo by Andrea Piacquadio