Several alarming headlines this week are a clarion call for intercessors. First, there was the horrific shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, GA, only a mile or two away from my work. It made international headlines. A startling fact was that the perpetrator was only 14 years of age. Within hours of the shooting, another 14-year-old made threats on social media against a school in Gainesville, GA.

On the same day, the police in Gainesville, GA, also arrested two children, ages 12 and 13, who committed an armed robbery in a park a few weeks before. Also, on September 4th, two teens between the ages of 12 and 14 robbed a contractor replacing signs in the city of Carrollton, GA, at gunpoint.

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What is both striking and disturbing is that these are kids committing violent crimes.

Is this just our state? Or is there something more disturbing going on among pre-teens and early teens nationwide?

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) reported an upward trend in both victimization and crimes committed by youth. Youths younger than 18 accounted for 11% of all homicide arrests in 2022, compared to 8.9% in 2021. In total, youths 17 and younger accounted for 9.9% of all arrests for violent crimes in 2022, up 1% from the previous year. More recent numbers are not yet available.

There is also an upward trend in adolescents carrying guns. According to a report by the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2022, gun carriage by teens ages 12-17 has increased by 41% between 2015 and 2019, with that number most likely rising higher in more recent years.

There’s More Than Meets the Eye

These trends point to social and spiritual shifts in American families, schools, and teens’ lives. I’m not going to address these as a sociologist or expert in teen psychology, but from years of ministry as a law enforcement chaplain, during which I served on numerous community and educational mental health task forces.

The 1995 Columbine High School shooting, in which two angry and socially isolated teenagers massacred twelve students and one teacher with high-powered rifles, was the harbinger of some dangerous trends taking place.

In the years that followed, law enforcement leaders began to call upon churches to step in and help. By the mid to late 1990s, more and more families fell apart, and an increasing number of parents who were still together had to both work to make ends meet. Their kids became known as “latchkey kids” because they would come home around three in the afternoon, let themselves in with a key, and be alone till one or both parents came home from work – often not till 6:30 or 7:00 p.m. No one knew what they were watching, who they were talking to, or what they were playing. Parents would come home exhausted from work and had to use the weekends to clean the house and shop for groceries. They had minimal time and emotional margin to engage with their kids.

The Riverside County Sheriff stated to clergy at a meeting in Temecula, CA, where I lived at the time, that they had seen hate groups move into the area because the abundance of lonely teens provided fertile recruiting ground. Hate groups and gangs give them discipline, a sense of belonging, and a way to vent their anger at being left alone so much, he said. It takes proactive parenting to teach respect for law and order, authority, and healthy ways of coping with disappointment and negative emotions. Neglecting that input creates an emotional vacuum that leaves their kids wide open to harmful influences.

The largely unparented latchkey kids of the 1990s have grown up and raised families – mostly without knowing how to parent, thus eroding parenting even further. School administrators have confirmed that. In mental health task force meetings, they have voiced increasing concern that parenting is left increasingly up to schools. This will never work. Public schools are desperate for churches to provide mentors to be available for kids on campus or provide after-school programs where they can receive homework help and life coaching till their parents come home.

The decrease in proactive parenting coincided with the rise of social media and online gaming. Kids now had to handle managing online profiles, which further confused their sense of identity and increased their social isolation. Kids deal with online bullying and exposure to the evils of the world largely alone.

And what about online gaming? While it is being debated in the world of psychology and science that violent video games contribute to real-world violence, the fact that 97% of teens play video games regularly, many of which contain violence of some sort, must be seen as an issue. In particular, revenge, which glorifies violence as a justified response to unfair treatment, seems to have appeal. Add access to guns to that mix, and you have a powder keg waiting to explode.

Spiritual Dynamics At Work

These trends point to our emerging generations being one of Satan’s favorite targets. Much of what ails our children mentally, emotionally, and spiritually should be dealt with at home (and ideally in a home that has the support of a church community). So what does the devil do? Break down marriages and families. This leaves children isolated and vulnerable. Enter step two in his plan: fill their moldable minds with what he wants them to hear and see: lies, identity confusion, strife, and violence.

I’m generalizing here. These are trends we’re talking about, and they do not apply to all families and parents—however, the trends point to spiritual dynamics we must take to the Lord in prayer.

We do that with thanksgiving for reverse trends that show God is at work, too. We have previously reported on the growth of after-school programs. In other encouraging news, Texas and Florida have passed laws allowing chaplains to volunteer on public school campuses to provide a much-needed spiritual presence.

However, they are drops in the bucket of our children’s needs. We must pray for all-out revival in schools and in families that will pave the way for a return to biblical family values and turn the tides on the multiple emotional and mental disorders that plague our youth and drive them to turn to violence. If Satan has taken aim at America’s children, we must fight him with the power of prayer. We must represent them before the throne of grace and ask God’s omnipotent hand to restrain violence and return their hearts to Him.

How to Pray

Three R’s come to mind to guide us in our prayers:

1. Repent on behalf of the American people who have stopped fighting for marriage and family, choose divorce instead of working things out, and have abdicated proactive parenting.
2. Renounce the work of the evil one through social media, online gaming, entertainment, and hosts of other things to destroy our children. Instead, proclaim them to be our future nation under God.
3. Release the love of God for children through our fervent intercession on their behalf. Appeal to His omnipotence to reclaim our families and schools and bring them into His kingdom where they can receive and embrace His design for marriage and family.

Father in heaven, You love children and have reserved harsh punishment for those who harm them. We pray for a mighty wind of revival to sweep our families and schools to reverse the worsening trends of children committing acts of gun violence. We recognize the devil’s scheme and pray that You command Your angel armies against Him. May all the pressures our families and children deal with soften their hearts and turn to Christ to find salvation, hope, peace, healing, and instruction in Your design for marriage and family. In Jesus’ Name. Amen!

Please share this with a friend! Our nation’s children need our prayers!

Remco Brommet is a pastor, spiritual-growth teacher, and prayer leader with over 40 years of experience in Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa, and the U.S. He was born and raised in the Netherlands and pastored his first church in Amsterdam. He moved to the U.S. in 1986. He and his wife, Jennifer, live north of Atlanta. When not writing books, he blogs at www.deeperlifeblog.com and assists his wife as a content developer and prayer coordinator for True Identity Ministries. Jennifer and Remco are passionate about bringing people into a deeper relationship with Christ.