I can get a little arrogant sometimes (I’m NOT proud of this sin in my life). I had a parenting crisis yesterday and I was VERY hesitant (even defiant) to pray… why!? I knew I needed to look into this more so I pulled out the Word and my favorite books on prayer to dig deeper to answer the question, why is prayer important for moms?
If God has called us to parent, we need His help. Period. Direction and guidance to parent comes from Him alone (through our guidebook, the Bible) and communication with God is an important element to our relationship with Him. When parenting becomes overwhelming (because it will), we have someone to pour our heart out to and He completely understands. Praying as a mom helps us to maintain our sanity (mental and spiritual) and straighten our priorities. It is fighting for our family, on our knees because Biblical parenting takes God-given strength and prayer refocuses us on Jesus.
SO, why is prayer important for moms?
Our help comes from God. He is the one that established the institution of family and He is the first and ultimate (perfect) parent! He knows what He’s doing. We are weak and in constant need of His help, guidance and sustaining grace. His word alone is our instruction manual for the Christian life. Are you believing that when it comes to your parenting? I mean really? So much so that we would actually make it a priority to seek Him and know His word and in turn allow it to change the way we live?
I will lift up my eyes to the mountains;
From where shall my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
Who made heaven and earth. -Psalm 121:1-2 NASB
Sanity. The morning I had yesterday was nothing short of crazy. I’ve been having a lot more of those chaos-filled mornings lately and mornings that start like that are enough to completely set off my anxiety switch. You better believe that the enemy knows that. Later, I realized something, while I have been in the Word, I haven’t been pouring my heart out to Him making communication with Him a priority. We have to remember, as servants and moms, we are merely vessels and if we’re constantly giving, we’re empty, parched vessels. We must allow and make time for the Lord to fill us to overflowing via prayer, so that we can in turn pour out to our children and families. All the junk I let overwhelm me isn’t my burden to bear. I can pour it out to the One who already took care of it, Jesus. Prayer changes our sinful motives and realigns them with Him. In no way does it manipulate God into doing what we want! Since I started dealing with heightened anxiety the past few months, scripture has become even more important than it used to be. I listed my top verses to combat anxiety in a post here.
And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. -2 Corinthians 12:9 NASB
These children He’s given us, and the chaos that comes with them are His. We by nature have very tender hearts, we bear multiple burdens and often find ourselves exhausted, overwhelmed and weary because of this. Seek Him in prayer, pour out your heart to Him. So, why is prayer important as a mom? Because your sanity depends on it! Allow Him to bear those burdens. He will do so gladly!
Jesus prayed. There are many instances in the Scripture where Jesus went off to pray. My favorite has got to be in Matthew 26 as Jesus prepares to give the ultimate sacrifice, His life. Jesus faced distress and grief in the Garden of Gethsemane. What did He do about it? He prayed!
Then Jesus came with them to a place called Gethsemane, and said to His disciples, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and distressed. Matthew 26:36-37 NASB
Communication is key. In any relationship, communication is a key ingredient. If we truly believe that God is the Source, we need to make our relationship with Him a priority. The act of praying and conversing with our Father in Heaven is communicating and building our relationship with Him. Teaching our kids to communicate with God is super important too and modeling is one of the best ways to do that! How often am I preoccupied with teaching my children to pray but often don’t make prayer a priority in my own life. You can read more about that in my post on teaching kids to pray here. Whether we’re crying out to Him, proclaiming His truths, interceding on behalf of a loved one, or praising Him for His faithfulness, we are communicating with Him and wouldn’t you know He desires to hear from us and longs to comfort His precious daughters.
…and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; -Acts 17:26-27 NASB
Prayer is an essential battle tool. I often pray for others throughout my day, but I always forget how much I need to be praying for ME. I don’t know about you but somewhere between schooling 3 children, being a wife, parenting, feeding, driving, studying, and dealing with constant squabbles of little people, I find myself in total burn out mode by the end of the day. This ministry (parenting) is like any other and is definitely subject to spiritual warfare… we need to be fighting on our knees. The Holy Spirit made this very apparent to me and I started jotting down prayers as the Spirit led. Fighting in the spiritual realms, not between the four walls of my home is where the battle should take place. I have the victory already, I just need to claim it.
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. -Ephesians 6:12 NASB
Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Just as it is written,
For Your sake we are being put to death all day long;
We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. -Romans 8:33-37 NASB
Let me be honest a bit. I’m really struggling with yelling at my children. The words fly when I find myself angry at poor reactions and behaviors. I am an angry hotheaded Mom. I hate it, it’s not ok and I am NOT bragging. I’m going to get even a tad more transparent here and share the prayer I wrote down for myself yesterday. My prayer was Spirit led and it was painful to write some of these words, but I want to be a conqueror not a coward and I’m thankful that the Father loves me so much that He sees it fit to point out my weaknesses so I can realize His strength. Why is prayer important as moms? It changes us.
Lord, may my vocal pleas be in the heavenly places alone and not in nagging and correcting my family. I pray that I engage in prayer combat and no other combat between those that I love. May no unwholesome word leave my lips and may my words be only for edification according to the need of the moment. Help me to know how to respond to each child. May I be fervent in love and my judgement be sound, not clouded by fear. May I not repay evil for evil, but repay with blessing. Lord, I commit my parenting works to you.
My plans are established because you said so (Proverbs 16:3). Give me wise words of love and comfort for my children. Let my eyes look directly ahead, my gaze fixed on You. May you alone Lord be my confidence- nothing and nobody else so that my children will find refuge in You. May I have joy and confidence in knowing that my children are walking in truth. I pray against any spirit of dissension, fighting and division in my home in Jesus’ name. This is the Lord’s house, it will not be filled with chaos, hatred, and confusion. In Christ’s victorious name, Amen.
One of the most beautiful, yet painful things about being a homeschool family is that we’re all together ALL. THE. TIME. I don’t know about you, but being with anyone for extended amounts of time is enough to drive anyone crazy. As moms, we are constantly giving of ourselves and the only one that can refill our empty tank is Jesus. God often calls us to do hard things (ahem… being a mom) and we can trust Him to prove faithful, but only when we’re allowing Him to do the work through us, not pridefully in our own strength. That dear momma, leads to burnout.
I’ve created a few images derived from my heartfelt prayer. I hope you’ll use them! Feel free to pin or save them.
Prayer is so important as a mom. SO, next time I decide to get haughty, I can reference this post and answer the all important question of why is prayer important for moms. I want to make sure this is a priority for me! Let’s hold each other accountable!?
