The statistics are heart-wrenching. I know them...I know them too well. As a product of many of those dreadful numbers, due to my own parents' divorce, I am anything but naive about the devastating effects divorce can have on children. So, walking into single parenthood eight years ago sickened me. Would my daughter simply end up as another one of those statistics? Even well-meaning people made sure I knew what I was heading into. My heart was already broken over the shocking divorce, and now I was being told that my daughter could very well end up a pregnant, high school drop out, drug user, alcohol abuser, co-dependent maladjusted young girl. How's that for encouragement?
But God...
God became my encourager. Each time someone implanted one of those statistics into my mind, yet again, I would just kindly respond, "Yes, sadly I'm aware of what the numbers reveal, but I'm choosing to believe my God is bigger than any statistic." I repeated this over and over and over. I continued to acknowledge the "facts". I wasn't oblivious to them, but I just chose to allow them not to dictate my life as a single parent.
Prayer for my daughter became almost like breathing for me. A day wouldn't pass without my lips offering up prayers of thanksgiving, prayers seeeking wisdom and protection, and BOLD prayers asking that God would let her rise above the statistics, rise above what the numbers "say" about her.
I got a glimpse of God's answer to those prayers this past weekend.
While I know that she is still a teenager...meaning hormonally imbalanced and quick to change her mind...I know that the time spent on my knees during those difficult years of single parenting was not in vain.
This past weekend, my daughter shared with me her sense of God's calling into some sort of ministry field...be it missions, orphan ministry, only God knows those future plans. And...only God can work that out in His perfect timing. She also told me that she has a heart for evangelism and for the "least of these". Whoa! This mama's heart is simply full right now.
Again, I'm not naive. I know that she has a few teen years left to go, but I continue to proclaim...my God is bigger than all the statistics!
I say all this to say...especially to my single parent bloggy friends...
...if you find yourself believing the forecasted numbers regarding your children
...if you find yourself doubting that anything good can ever come out of your single parent status
...if you find yourself believing the worst for your children but hoping for the best
...if you find yourself giving up...
I'm here to give you hope. Don't stop praying for your children, and regardless of what the statistics reveal, just know our God is bigger than all of them!
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