A Prayer for Widows With Teens

In these days brimming with proms, graduations, open houses, college applications and summer job hunting, widows with teens, and teens without dads, sometimes put up a fragile front. Please be sensitive to them---yes, they DO miss him. The world will never, ever know how much. Please pray for them.

Dear Heavenly Father,

Your Word says you will be a father to the fatherless. We come before you today in humility and neediness to ask you to fulfill your Word in the lives of fatherless teens today--for their benefit as well as the relief and benefit of their mom.

Lord, many widowed moms fall into bed each night wrung out beyond exhaustion---and then they can't sleep! Their minds overload with stress and "to do" lists as they take on the work and responsibilites of two adults, and add to that the concern for the future of their children. Please send them kindness and rest, and help them recognize your good hand of mercy and blessing.

We pray their teenagers will know your salvation. That if they have not yet received it, you will stir them through the work of your Holy Spirit and make them alive in Christ. Protect them from the blind rage and bitterness of grief. Use this time of their life to turn them to you. Help their mother to help them, and not to be so buried in her own grief that they are neglected.

Cover them, both teens and moms, with your grace; that they may begin to live again, lifted from the ashes, growing in your grace, hope and purpose.

Fill them with a love for learning from Scripture. May it be a lamp unto their feet and a light for their path during these days of new beginnings, passions and hormones. Strengthen them morally and give them each the courage to be morally pure in thought, word and walk. Grant understanding and respect --that the teens respect their mom, and that the mother understands and respects her children--and herself. Protect her from the temptations of escape and help her uphold the moral standards she desires for her family. May the Holy Spirit cut through her grief and fill her with the comfort and guidance of Scripture.

Guide them, Lord. I'm praying big on this one, far beyond the blessings I can imagine; I ask that you open doors for them that lead to wisdom, goodness, abundant joy and the spread of your kingdom. May their desire be to live according to your will. Protect them and deliver them from evil.

In Your Name we pray,
amen.