Praying for a Child of a Divorce

I'll be honest with you. Parenting under the circumstance of divorce where there is some shared custody, is hard. To say the least. Especially when you don't parent the same or view anything the same at all as the other parent. When you want to shake the other parent and say, "For real??? What are you thinking?? Hello!!!???!!!" I have had some tense moments, hours, days, even weeks in the last few years over Allie and the shared parenting her dad and I do. I'm sure any parent who has been through a divorce can relate. Luckily, it's one of the ways God has broken me and brought me to my knees. Mainly because there was nowhere else I could go. I have had to unclench my fists (literally), raise my hands to heaven, and whisper to God, "Here you go. Here's Allie. Here's this latest situation. It's Yours. You will handle it so much better than I will. You are the only One with any real power in the situation anyway. Do with it as You please. She is Yours."

The timing of yesterday's blog about my personal testimony of God's faithfulness was perfect. We've had a few "tense moments" in the last days (holidays are always fun. Where's the Zanax? :)) I've been thinking about God's faithfulness during those years a lot, and as we were driving around looking for a couch today (we've also been without a couch for 9 months now, but that's another story), God almost audibly said to me, "Julie, if you remember correctly, I was faithful even when you were not faithful. I protected Allie even when you didn't. I cared for Allie when you weren't sure how. Even when you weren't praying all the time and striving to be this awesome momma, I took care of her. She is more than a conqueror through Me. She will be okay whether you do everything right or not. Whether her dad does everything right or not. I love her even more than either of you do. Trust My faithfulness."

And that is the point we have to come to as parents, whether of a divorce situation or not. God's Word says that He is faithful, even when we are not faithful (2 Timothy 2:13). His faithfulness reaches to the clouds (Psalm 36:5). His faithfulness endures to all generations ((Psalm 119:90). Great is His faithfulness! (Lamentations 3:23). Now this is not to say that since He is faithful, we can just sit around and trust that He will do the work. He who calls you is faithful. (1 Thessalonians 5:24). If you have a child, you are called to parent in a way that glorifies God. But there is a point in all parenting when we don't know for sure if we've done the right thing, or if our doing the right thing has been enough, and at that moment, it sure is wonderful to know that He will prove faithful to our children. No matter what. We can't mess it up so much that God will not continue to show His faithfulness to the next generation. This truth helps me sleep at night. "I will lie down and sleep in peace, FOR YOU ALONE, O LORD, make me (and my children) dwell in safety." -Psalm 4:8.