A Parent's Prayer

As a parent, it seems I always have some pressing concern for my children—those concerns which keep me up at night and follow me around like a shadow all throughout the day. Sometimes, it’s an unanswered question about parenting for which I’m desperate to know what to do. Or I may have a difficult decision to make regarding one of my kids and don’t know which way to turn. It seems I always have worries and cares for them that I long to see resolved like those regarding their health, relationships, education, or their future.

I imagine you have concerns and cares for your children as well. In my book, Like Our Father: How God Parents Us and Why That Matters for Our Parenting, I look to our Father in heaven for wisdom and guidance about all those concerns, questions, and cares we have for our children. I look at the ways he perfectly parents us and what we can learn from him in parenting our own children.

One of the things I encourage readers to do is to bring all their cares to their Father in heaven. At the end of each chapter, I provide a prayer for parents to pray. So what are your concerns for your children today? What questions loom at the front of your mind each day? What burdens do you bear regarding your children? Your Father in heaven invites you to bring all those cares before him in prayer.

A Parent’s Prayer

Father in heaven,

What a privilege it is to come before you in prayer! It means I am your child and you are my Father. I am your beloved and an heir of your kingdom. I am no longer an orphan but have been brought into your family and given a forever home with you. Your word tells me that you know all the cares of my heart before I even do, yet you invite me to bring them to you in prayer. I can’t help but think of my own children coming to me, asking for my help, and how glad I am to help them and provide for their needs.

You are my perfect Father, loving me before time began. You show me what a parent does for his or her children. You provide for all my needs. You set boundaries for me and teach me the way of righteousness. You discipline me for my good. You are patient and kind with me. You are consistent in all your ways toward me. In all these ways and more, you care for me as your child. Help me to learn from you what it looks like to raise my own children. As I parent them, I pray they would see you through my actions and responses. I pray my parenting would show them who you are as their perfect Father.

Forgive me for putting me hope and trust in parenting methods and strategies to make my parenting “work.” While these strategies can be and often are helpful, when I trust in them instead of you, my heart turns from you. I yield my heart to those lesser things, looking for them to make my life better, instead of you—my source of life. Forgive me for not loving my family the way you have loved me. I am easily frustrated and impatient. I am prone to expect things of my children I wouldn’t even expect of myself. Forgive me for forgetting that my children need the same grace I need—the grace you’ve provided through Jesus Christ. Help me to keep the gospel at the forefront of my mind and heart as I parent my children.

The Bible tells me you are the source of all wisdom. I come to you with many questions about raising my children. How do I…? Every day there are decisions to be made. I often feel ill-equipped in my parenting and just don’t know what to do. I need your wisdom to know how to raise my children—what to teach them, how to correct them, the best ways to respond to them, and how to love them well. Father, please help me as I seek to raise them in a way that honors you. Grant me the wisdom only you can give.

I long for my children to know you as their Father. I know you love them more than I ever could; you love them with a perfect love. Help me to trust you and your work in their lives. May they never know a day when they did not know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. May they grow and mature into godly young adults who live for you and your glory. Protect their minds and hearts from evil all their days.

Please hear this prayer for my parenting. I cling to your promise in 2 Peter 1, that you given me “all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence” (v.3). Grant me all I need to parent for your glory.

In Jesus’ name, amen.

*Photo by Bethany Beck on Unsplash

For the Heart that is Overwhelmed

This is the time of year I most feel overwhelmed. That back to school, back to sports, back to parent volunteer duties, back to driving everywhere time of year. It comes on like a deluge and I feel as though I am drowning in responsibilities and places I have to be and worries I will forget to pick someone up.

But to add a pandemic on top of it all is a whole other thing.

Your fall may look far different from mine but I would venture to say you feel just as overwhelmed. We all are. Overwhelmed by losses, changes, and the unknowns. Overwhelmed by news reports and disheartening stories. Overwhelmed by what is happening in the world and in our culture. Overwhelmed by worries, fears, and stressors. Just when we think there couldn’t possibly one more bad thing to happen this year, we learn of another event. We try to cope with these emotions by reading and sharing memes that joke about 2020. If we could, we’d push fast forward on this year and skip ahead to the next, hoping for a brighter future on the other side of December 31st.

For some of us, feeling overwhelmed stops us in our tracks. We freeze in place and struggle to make simple decisions. Others of us might get out our to-do lists in an attempt to reign in all that is out of control. Still others may turn to distractions to get their mind on something else for a change. Often, feeling overwhelmed can lead us to look to false saviors for help and hope in the midst of the chaos. To be honest, I know each of these responses well.

And I’m still overwhelmed.

One of the things that weighs me down the most when I am overwhelmed is when I look ahead to the future. Whatever it is that overwhelms me, I simply can’t imagine bearing the load day after day. My resources are slim and I fear running out of time, energy, wisdom, creativity, and strength. I look at the calendar and fear I simply won’t have what it takes to get through the coming month. I look at all the responsibilities stacked up high and worry I can’t complete them. I consider all the things that could go wrong in the days and weeks to come and my worries press down on me even more.

All too often, I live there in the future, focused on what may or may not happen. I worry about not being prepared. I fear running short. I fear not having enough, not being enough, not doing enough. In doing so, I forget that God is greater than anything that may overwhelm me. I forget who he is and what he has done. I forget his extravagant grace in providing what I need most: salvation from sin. I forget he is Jehovah Jireh and all the times he has provided for me in the past. I forget how he has strengthened me in my weakness, sustained me in trials, and carried me in my sorrows.

I also forget that his mercy for me is new each day and his well of grace never runs dry. He is the source and wellspring of all that I need to live for him in this crazy and chaotic world. In fact, he’s already provided everything I need to live a life of godliness (2 Peter 1:3). Yet, rather than trust in God to strengthen and sustain me each day, I’m like the Israelites who collected more manna than they needed, thinking they would store it up for the next day—only to find it rotten and inedible. I live my life on the insufficient fumes of my own resources instead of the grace God generously provides.

The truth is God doesn’t call us to depend upon ourselves; he calls us to trust in him to provide what we need to live for him. He gives us just what we need for each day and promises to be there on the next to provide for us again. And he is not stingy with his grace, for as John wrote “he gives us grace upon grace” (John 1:16). God doesn’t tell us what tomorrow brings; rather, he calls us to follow after him, trusting he will lead and guide us. The Israelites did not know the path through the desert; God led them as a pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night. He leads us today by his word and his Spirit at work within us. We may not have a map or know what tomorrow brings, but we are assured God is with us and will give us just what we need.

For all the hearts that are overwhelmed today, we need that gentle reminder that God is far bigger than whatever overwhelms us. He owns all things, keeps all things, and sustains all things. May we live in his grace today.

Three Certainties for Uncertain Times

Uncertainty. If there’s one word I would use to describe this year and life during a world-wide crisis, it’s uncertainty. The dictionary defines uncertainty as “being in a state of regular or constant change.”

Sounds about right.

Just about everything is uncertain these days. Health. Jobs. The economy. School this fall. Things change on a daily basis so there seems little in which to plant our hopes or expectations for the future. It’s hard to know what or who to depend upon—or believe. And with all the uncertainty comes a host of questions which swirl around our mind each day. Will I get sick? Will someone in my family get sick? How bad will it be? What will happen to my job—will I even keep it? What will school be like for our children this fall? And always percolating in the back of our mind is the big unknown: When will things ever return to normal?

As believers, we are not left on our own to navigate through uncertain times. While uncertainty is hard and challenging, we do have hope. We have certainty even in uncertain times.

Three Certainties for Uncertain Times

God Does Not Change: At times of uncertainty we have to return to what is true about God. We have to reminds ourselves of his character. One of God’s attributes is that he does not change. Malachi 3:6 says, “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.“ God’s people had sinned against him but he did not destroy them because of the covenant he made with them. His promises stood firm. Theologians called this unchanging nature of God his immutability. Nothing about God can change. He can’t become less holy or righteous or merciful than he is. He can’t gain more wisdom or be more just than he already is. He won’t stop loving us or providing for us. He is the same, yesterday, today, and forever (Heb. 13:8).

In times of chaos and constant change, God’s immutability is a fixed and steady truth for us to cling to. We can trust his promises for us will stand secure. We can know his word remains forever. We can trust that who God is in his character and being is the same today as it was when he called Abram out of Ur and when Isaiah saw him seated on the throne of heaven. He is the same God who sent the eternal Son to live and die in our place. God is the same promise-keeping, grace-showering, life-giving God, today and always.

God is Sovereign: God is not surprised by all this uncertainty. He is not taken off guard or caught unawares by the chaos. He has not gotten busy with some other task in the universe and returned to find the world a giant mess. God is sovereign. He is the supreme sovereign. “…for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose’” (Isaiah 46:9-10).

The One who flung the stars across the galaxy, the One who breathed in man the breath of life, is the One who rules over all he has made. As Christians, we can take great hope in knowing that God is sovereign over all details of our lives. Nothing and no one can thwart his good plans for us. He is at work in the midst of all the chaos, confusion, and uncertainty, orchestrating all things for our good and his glory (Rom. 8:28-29).

God is With Us: Even more, God is present with us in the chaos. The meta-promise of Scripture, “I will be their God and they shall be my people” was fulfilled in Christ when he took on human flesh and lived the life we could not live and died the death we deserved. Immanuel— God with us— brought order to the chaos of this world by healing all that was broken. He reconciled us to God. There are now no barriers between us; we can come to the throne in confidence and find help and grace in our time of need (Heb. 4:16).

Before our Savior returned to heaven, he promised a Helper would come. The Spirit has come and now lives within us. The very presence of God resides in our hearts. He comforts, guides, teaches, convicts, and trains us in righteousness. God is with us! Whatever the chaos, whatever the uncertainty, whatever the unknowns, we are not alone. We are held safe and secure. No evil can threaten to undo us. Let our hearts rejoice that God is near.

This is an uncertain time. There’s no telling how long it will go on. But as believers, we are not without hope. In the midst of uncertainty, we have a certain hope in our great God who is unchanging, sovereign, and present with us. May we rest in these certainties today.