🌸 When You Are Caring for Aging Parents and the Roles Begin to Reverse

“Even to your old age, I am He,
And even to gray hairs I will carry you!” — Isaiah 46:4

There is a strange tenderness that comes with realizing your parents are getting older.

For much of your life, they were the ones who knew what to do.

They drove you where you needed to go. They reminded you about appointments. They worried when you were sick. They made decisions, handled problems, and somehow seemed capable of taking care of things you did not even know needed taking care of.

And then, little by little, something changes.

Now you are the one asking, “Did you take your medicine?”

You are driving to the appointment.

You are listening carefully while the doctor speaks.

You are checking the refrigerator, paying attention to the mail, asking about bills, noticing the stairs, watching how they walk, and wondering whether they should still be driving.

Sometimes the change happens gradually.

Sometimes one illness, fall, hospitalization, or diagnosis changes everything almost overnight.

And suddenly you are making decisions for the person who once made decisions for you.

That can be hard on the heart.

Because this is still Mom.

This is still Dad.

You may know that something needs to change while also understanding why they resist it.

They have spent decades making their own choices. They may not want to be reminded that they need help.

And you may not want to be the one telling them.

There can be moments of frustration.

Repeated conversations.

Questions you thought had already been answered.

Appointments they do not want to attend.

Help they insist they do not need.

And underneath your frustration may be something you have not said aloud:

I do not want to lose you.

Sometimes caregiving is not only physically tiring. It carries a quiet kind of grief.

You are watching someone you love change.

You may miss the parent who used to give you advice.

You may wish you could call Mom and have her take care of something for you again.

You may sit with your father and realize that the man who once seemed so strong now needs your arm to steady himself.

Those moments can catch you off guard.

And there may also be guilt.

Guilt because you are tired.

Guilt because you became impatient.

Guilt because part of you wishes someone else would handle the next appointment.

Guilt because you have your own family, work, health, responsibilities, and life that still need your attention.

But loving your parents does not mean you stop being human.

You can be grateful that they are still here and still feel overwhelmed by what caring for them requires.

You can honor them and still need help.

You can love them deeply and still need boundaries.

And you will not make every decision perfectly.

One of the things I love about Isaiah 46:4 is that God does not only speak about the strength we need to carry someone else.

He says:

“I will carry you.”

That promise belongs to your aging parent.

But it belongs to you too.

While you are trying to carry medications, appointments, decisions, worry, responsibilities, and the changing needs of someone you love, God is reminding you:

You are not the only one carrying this family.

He is still God to your mother.

He is still God to your father.

And He is still God to you.

You do not have to know how the entire season will unfold.

You only need grace for the part in front of you today.

A MOMENT to Reflect

What part of caring for your parent feels heaviest right now?

You do not have to solve it in this moment.

Just tell God the truth about it.

A MOMENT Prayer

Father,

Thank You for the people who once cared for me.

It is difficult sometimes to watch them grow older and to realize how much has changed.

Give me patience when I am tired.

Give me wisdom when decisions are difficult.

Help me honor my parent while also recognizing my own limits.

And when I begin to feel as though everything depends on me, remind me that it does not.

You love them even more than I do.

Carry them.

And Father, please carry me too.

Amen.

🌸 A MOMENT to Carry With You

You may be caring for the person who once cared for you.

But you are not carrying this season alone.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸 A Moment For the Caregiver

“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” — Matthew 11:28

Caregiving can be an act of deep love.

It can also be exhausting.

Sometimes it looks like sitting beside a hospital bed. Sometimes it is helping a spouse get dressed, taking a parent to another appointment, picking up prescriptions, preparing meals, answering the same question again, or simply making sure someone you love is safe.

A lot of caregiving happens where no one else sees it.

People may ask how your loved one is doing.

They may ask what the doctor said.

They may ask whether things are getting better.

But sometimes no one asks:

How are you doing?

And even when someone does ask, you may not know how to answer.

Because you love the person you are caring for.

You are grateful you can be there.

You would probably do it all over again.

And you are tired.

Those things can all be true at the same time.

You can love someone and still need a break.

You can be thankful and still feel overwhelmed.

You can be strong and still have moments when you want somebody else to make the decisions, answer the phone, prepare the meal, or sit beside the bed for a while.

That does not make you selfish.

It means you are carrying something heavy.

Jesus never asked us to pretend that heavy things are light.

He said,

“Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden…”

He already knows you are tired.

He knows about the interrupted sleep.

He knows about the worries you do not say aloud.

He knows the decisions you are trying to make.

He knows what it feels like to watch someone you love change.

And He sees the things you do that may never receive a thank-you.

Perhaps today you do not need another list of things you should be doing better.

Maybe you simply need permission to admit:

This is hard.

And maybe your prayer does not need to be long.

It can simply be:

“Lord, I need You today.”

Sometimes rest will look like sleep.

Sometimes it may look like accepting help.

Sometimes it may mean letting someone else handle one thing.

Sometimes it is sitting quietly for ten minutes without answering anybody.

And sometimes rest is simply remembering that while you are caring for someone else, God is still caring for you.

A MOMENT to Reflect

What do you need today that you have been hesitant to admit you need?

You do not have to explain it to anyone.

Just bring it honestly to God.

A MOMENT Prayer

Father,

Thank You for seeing me as I care for someone I love.

You know the parts that are beautiful, and You know the parts that are difficult.

You know when I am tired, worried, frustrated, grateful, afraid, or simply trying to make it through another day.

Help me remember that I do not have to carry everything by myself.

Give me wisdom for what needs my attention today and peace about what can wait.

And remind me that the caregiver needs care too.

Thank You for caring for me while I care for someone else.

Amen.

🌸 A MOMENT to Carry With You

You can love someone deeply and still be tired.

You can be the caregiver and still need care.

And you do not have to carry today alone.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸 When Your Adult Child Chooses Differently

Scripture

“And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.” — 1 Peter 4:8 (KJV)

There comes a time in motherhood when advice becomes something your child can choose not to take.

That may be one of the hardest adjustments of all.

You can spend years teaching, correcting, praying, setting boundaries and trying to give your child a foundation that will help them make wise decisions.

Then one day, that child is grown.

And the decision is theirs.

They may choose a career you would not have chosen.

A relationship that concerns you.

A different way of raising their own children.

They may handle money differently.

Make decisions about where or how they live that you do not understand.

They may question things you thought were firmly settled.

They may even make choices that conflict with the faith and values you worked hard to teach them.

What does a mother do then?

Because loving an adult child is different from raising one.

There are some things a mother can no longer require.

There are consequences she cannot prevent.

There are lessons she cannot teach on her timetable.

And there are decisions she simply does not get to make anymore.

That does not mean she stops being a mother.

It means motherhood has entered a different season.

I have listened to mothers talk about this season.

Sometimes underneath the concern is fear.

What if this choice hurts my child?

Sometimes it is disappointment.

I thought she knew better.

Sometimes there is confusion.

Where did this come from?

And sometimes there is a quieter question that a mother may be almost afraid to say aloud:

Did I do something wrong?

Maybe that is one of the places where God needs to meet a mother's heart too.

Your adult child's choices are not a final report card on your motherhood.

You can teach well and your child can choose differently.

You can pray faithfully and your child can still make a mistake.

You can create a loving home and raise a child who eventually sees some things differently than you do.

Their ability to choose is part of becoming an adult.

And that leaves a mother with a different kind of work to do.

Not controlling.

Not rescuing every time life becomes uncomfortable.

Not withdrawing love to make a point.

Not turning every conversation into another opportunity to convince them.

Sometimes the work is learning how to remain close without taking over.

That doesn't mean you cannot speak.

Love is not silence.

There may be moments when you need to say:

“I love you. I don't agree with this decision, and I want to be honest about that.”

But what happens after you say it matters too.

Can you still listen?

Can you still have dinner together?

Can you still call just to ask how the day went without bringing the decision into every conversation?

Can your child disagree with you and still know there is a place at your table?

That can be difficult when you believe they are making a mistake.

Because sometimes rescuing looks a lot like love.

Sometimes control disguises itself as concern.

And sometimes withdrawing feels like the only way to communicate how seriously we disagree.

But there is another choice.

We can give our adult children room to experience God for themselves.

God is capable of reaching them without our constant commentary.

He can convict.

He can redirect.

He can teach.

He can close doors.

He can open others.

He can use consequences.

He can send people into their lives.

And He can do something mothers sometimes struggle to do:

He can work on His timetable instead of ours.

That does not mean every choice will eventually become the choice you wanted.

Sometimes the harder surrender is accepting that your grown child may build a life that simply looks different from the one you pictured.

And you may have to ask God to show you the difference between something that is truly harmful and something that is simply different from you.

That distinction matters.

Because the goal was never to raise another version of ourselves.

It was to raise a person who would eventually stand before God with a life, a conscience, choices and a relationship with Him that are her own.

So when you are tempted to chase, control, rescue or withdraw, there may be another prayer to pray:

Father, show me how to love my child well in the life she is actually living—not only in the life I hoped she would choose.

That kind of love does not require agreement.

But it may require trust.

Not only trust in your child.

Trust in God.

🌸 The MOMENT

If your adult child has chosen differently, ask yourself:

Does my child know that my love remains even when my agreement does not?

Then bring the part you cannot control to God.

You do not have to solve your adult child's life.

You can speak truth with love.

You can maintain healthy boundaries.

You can stop rescuing.

You can keep the door open.

And you can pray.

Sometimes the most faithful thing a mother can do is entrust to God the child she can no longer lead by the hand.

🙏 A Prayer for the Mother of an Adult Child

Father, You know this child better than anyone. You know the hopes her mother carried for her, the prayers she has prayed and the things that concern her now.

Give her wisdom to know when to speak and when to listen. Show her where loving has become rescuing, where concern has become control, or where disappointment is tempting her to pull away.

Help her see her child clearly—not only through the decisions she wishes were different.

Give her courage to maintain necessary boundaries without withholding love. When she is afraid, remind her that her child is never beyond Your reach.

And when the life her child chooses looks different from the life she imagined, help her trust You with the parts of the story she cannot write.

Keep the relationship tender enough for conversation, strong enough for truth and covered in Your grace.

In Jesus' name, Amen.

MOMENT: My adult child's choices belong to her. How I love her while she makes them belongs to me.

Pause. Pray. Love without taking over.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸 I Don't Want to Forgive Yet

Scripture

“Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” — Psalm 51:10 (KJV)

There are some prayers that are easier to pray than others.

“Lord, protect my family.”

“Give me wisdom.”

“Help me make the right decision.”

And then there are prayers that catch in my throat because I know what I am asking God to do will require something from me.

Forgiveness can be one of them.

There are hurts we can talk ourselves through fairly quickly. Someone says something thoughtless. Feelings are hurt. An apology comes. We pray about it, talk about it, and eventually we move forward.

But some things cut deeper.

Someone betrayed your trust.

Someone lied about you.

Someone you loved knew exactly where you were vulnerable and hurt you there anyway.

A family member caused a wound that has followed you for years.

A spouse broke something between you that an apology cannot immediately repair.

Someone hurt your child.

Someone never apologized at all.

And then we read the words of Jesus about forgiveness.

We know what Scripture says.

We know what we have been taught.

But somewhere inside, there may still be a very honest response:

Father, I don't want to forgive yet.

I think we sometimes become uncomfortable admitting that to God.

It sounds wrong.

Unspiritual.

Like something a Christian woman should have worked through already.

So we may say the words before our hearts have caught up with them.

“I forgive.”

But underneath those words there may still be anger.

Grief.

Questions.

A desire for the person who hurt us to understand what they did.

Sometimes even a desire for them to hurt a little too.

God already knows.

That is why I don't think healing begins by pretending with Him.

It begins with truth.

Father, this hurt me.

I am angry.

I don't understand why they did this.

Part of me is still waiting for an apology.

Part of me wants justice.

And if I am being completely truthful with You, I am not ready to let this go.

That is an uncomfortable prayer.

But it is an honest one.

And honesty with God gives Him something we often protect from everyone else:

access to the wound.

Forgiveness does not require us to call wrong things right.

It does not erase consequences.

It does not automatically restore trust.

It does not always mean reconciliation.

And it certainly does not require returning to a relationship that is unsafe.

Forgiveness and access are not the same thing.

You can forgive someone and still need boundaries.

You can forgive someone and recognize that the relationship has changed.

You can forgive someone without receiving the apology you deserved.

And sometimes forgiveness is not one dramatic moment when every painful feeling disappears.

Sometimes it begins much smaller.

“Father, I am willing for You to make me willing.”

I love that prayer because it doesn't pretend.

It doesn't ask me to manufacture feelings I do not have.

It simply opens the door.

A little.

Enough for God to begin working.

Because when I hold tightly to what someone did to me, eventually I am carrying more than the memory of what happened.

I may begin carrying the anger into other relationships.

The suspicion.

The defensiveness.

The expectation that someone else will hurt me too.

The wound begins asking people who did not cause it to pay for it.

And I don't want someone else's wrongdoing to keep deciding who I become.

That is where forgiveness begins to look different to me.

It isn't saying:

“What you did doesn't matter.”

It is saying:

“What you did will not have the final word over my heart.”

God will.

I may still remember.

I may still need boundaries.

There may still be consequences.

There may even be days when I have to bring the same hurt back to God because I discovered another piece of it I had not surrendered.

But I can keep bringing it.

Not because the person who hurt me has earned something from me.

Because I want God to have all of me—including the part that still hurts.

🌸 The MOMENT

Maybe you are not ready to pray:

“Father, I forgive them.”

Don't give God words you don't mean.

Start where you really are.

“Father, You know what happened. You know what it did to me. I don't want this hurt to keep living in me. I am not ready yet, but I am willing for You to make me willing.”

And then stay there with Him.

You don't have to force the next sentence.

God already knows it.

🙏 A Prayer When Forgiveness Is Hard

Father, You know what happened, and You know what it cost me. You know the parts I talk about and the parts I have never said aloud.

I confess that I do not want to forgive yet. Part of me is still angry. Part of me still wants answers. Part of me wants the person who hurt me to understand exactly what they did.

I don't want to pretend with You.

So I am bringing You my heart exactly as it is.

Please do in me what I cannot do for myself. Keep bitterness from taking root in places I cannot see. Give me wisdom about boundaries, courage where truth needs to be spoken, and restraint where silence is wiser.

I am not asking You to make what happened acceptable. I am asking You to keep what happened from changing me into someone You never intended me to become.

Father, I am willing for You to make me willing.

Create in me a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me.

In Jesus' name, Amen.

🌸 Continue the Conversation

What has God taught you about forgiveness?

MOMENT: Forgiveness does not begin with pretending the hurt no longer matters. Sometimes it begins by letting God into the place where it still does.

Pause. Pray. Be honest. Let God begin there.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸 I Love My Child, but I Cannot Live Her Life

Scripture

“Trust in him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us.” — Psalm 62:8 (KJV)

There was a time when so much of my child's life was mine to manage.

I decided what she ate. What time she went to bed. Where she went. Who cared for her. I scheduled appointments, talked with teachers, bought the clothes, packed what she needed and tried to anticipate problems before they became problems.

When she was little, protecting her often meant doing something.

Then children grow.

And one of the harder parts of motherhood is realizing that the job begins to change before our hearts are completely ready for it.

They have opinions we did not give them.

Friendships we did not choose.

Conversations we are not part of.

Experiences we cannot arrange.

Disappointments we cannot prevent.

Eventually, they will make decisions we would not make.

And that can be frightening when you have spent years believing that part of loving your child means keeping her safe.

I am learning that there comes a point when loving my child also means recognizing where her life begins and mine ends.

That does not mean I stop parenting.

It does not mean I become silent when she needs guidance.

It does not mean I ignore something dangerous or pretend every choice is a good one.

It means I have to remember something that motherhood can make surprisingly difficult to remember:

My child belongs to God before she belongs to me.

I can teach her.

I can pray for her.

I can set boundaries while she is under my care.

I can tell her what I have learned.

I can remind her who she is.

I can create a home where she knows she can come to me.

But I cannot believe for her.

I cannot make every decision for her.

I cannot keep every hurt from reaching her.

I cannot follow her into every room she will ever enter.

And I cannot live her life.

That last one is difficult.

Because sometimes we can see something coming.

We recognize the friendship that may hurt them.

We know what can happen when a decision is made too quickly.

We remember mistakes from our own lives and desperately want to save our children from learning certain lessons the way we had to learn them.

Everything in us wants to reach in and rearrange the pieces.

But there will be moments when our children need something from us that feels much harder than fixing:

They need us to trust God with them.

Not casually.

Not because we have run out of things to do.

But because He can go where we cannot.

God can be with my child in the classroom when I am not there.

He can sit beside her at the lunch table.

He can be present in conversations I will never hear.

He can bring conviction when my words are no longer the words she wants to hear.

He can place people in her life who reinforce what she has been taught at home.

He can protect her in ways I will never know about.

And when she makes mistakes—and she will, because she is human—God can meet her there too.

Maybe part of raising a child is slowly learning to move our hands from holding tightly to holding faithfully.

There is a difference.

Holding tightly says, I have to make sure everything turns out right.

Holding faithfully says, Father, show me what is mine to do, and help me trust You with what is not.

I think I will be learning that prayer for a long time.

Because independence does not arrive all at once.

It comes in little pieces.

The first time they don't want your help.

The first decision they make without asking you.

The first thing they would rather tell a friend.

The first time you realize they have been working something out in their own mind before bringing it to you.

And eventually, the bigger things come too.

Education.

Work.

Relationships.

Marriage.

Faith.

The direction of their lives.

A mother's love does not become smaller as her child's world becomes larger.

But our role has to make room for growth.

And maybe one of the greatest gifts we can give our children is the freedom to become the people God is calling them to be—not simply the people we imagined they would become.

That requires something from us too.

It requires knowing when to speak.

Knowing when to listen.

Knowing when to step in.

Knowing when to step back.

And knowing that stepping back does not mean stepping away.

Sometimes it simply means making room for our children to recognize God's voice for themselves.

🌸 The MOMENT

There may be something in your child's life right now that you wish you could manage for her.

Before you step in, ask God:

“Father, what is mine to do here?”

And then ask the harder question:

“What belongs to You?”

The answer may not always be comfortable.

But motherhood was never meant to make us our children's God.

It gives us the sacred responsibility of helping them know the One who is.

🙏 A Mother's Prayer

Father, thank You for trusting me with the privilege of being her mother. You know how deeply I love her. You also know the places where my love becomes worry and where my desire to protect her makes it difficult for me to loosen my grip.

Give me wisdom to know when she needs my guidance and when she needs room to grow. Help me listen before I correct, pray before I react and speak in ways that keep the door between us open.

Protect her when I cannot. Give her discernment when I am not there to advise her. Surround her with people who will encourage what is good in her. When she makes mistakes, meet her with the same grace and mercy You have given me.

And Father, when I am tempted to take responsibility for things that belong to You, remind me that You love her even more than I do.

Help me raise her with open hands.

In Jesus' name, Amen.

MOMENT: My child needs my love, my guidance and my prayers. She does not need me to live her life.

Pause. Pray. Guide. Trust God with the rest.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸 The Prayer I’m Still Praying

“Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD.” — Psalm 27:14 (KJV)

There are prayers I have carried to God more than once.

Not because I believe He did not hear me the first time.

I return because He is my Father, and this is where I take the things that matter to me.

I have prayed for people I love. For direction. For doors to open. For situations to change. For things I cannot fix myself.

And sometimes the answer has not come when I hoped it would.

I am learning that there is a difference between waiting for an answer and waiting with God.

Waiting for an answer can keep my eyes fixed on what has not happened yet.

Waiting with God brings my attention back to Him.

That does not make the prayer less important. It does not mean I stop asking. It means I remember that my relationship with my Father is bigger than the answer I am waiting for.

I can trust Him without understanding His timing.

I can keep praying without allowing the prayer to become the only thing I think about.

I can leave room for God to answer differently than I imagined.

And I can continue receiving the life He has placed in front of me today.

There is still someone to love.

There is still someone who needs encouragement.

There is still laughter in my home.

There is still work worth doing.

There are still ordinary mornings, conversations around the table, phone calls, birthdays, sunsets, Sabbaths, friendships, and quiet moments with God.

These are not distractions from the waiting.

They are part of the life God is giving me while I wait.

Sometimes we can become so focused on what we are asking God to do next that we overlook what He may be doing now.

Perhaps He is strengthening something in us.

Perhaps He is protecting us from something we cannot see.

Perhaps circumstances are being arranged that we know nothing about.

Perhaps the answer will look different from the one we pictured.

And sometimes we simply do not know.

Faith does not require me to know.

It asks me to trust the One who does.

That is difficult for me because I like to know what comes next. I like a plan. I like to understand how the pieces fit together.

But God has not promised to show me every piece.

He has promised me Himself.

So I am learning to bring the prayer to Him and leave a little more of its weight there each time.

Father, this still matters to me.

I still desire an answer.

But I trust You with what I cannot see.

And then I can get up from prayer and tend to the life He has given me.

I can make breakfast.

I can encourage my child.

I can love my family.

I can do today’s work well.

I can call someone who needs to hear my voice.

I can laugh when something is funny.

I can make plans while remaining open to His plans.

I can notice His goodness without feeling as though I have forgotten the thing I am still praying about.

Because waiting on God was never meant to mean stepping away from life until He gives me what I asked for.

Waiting is part of walking with Him.

God’s silence does not mean His absence.

I do not know everything He is doing.

But I know Who I am waiting with.

🌸 The MOMENT

Is there a prayer that has begun to occupy so much of your heart that it is becoming difficult to see what God has placed around you today?

You do not have to stop praying it.

Bring it to your Father again.

And then ask Him:

“Father, while I wait, what would You have me notice today?”

Perhaps the answer for today is not an explanation.

Perhaps it is simply His presence.

🙏 A Prayer While I Wait

Father,

You know what I am waiting for. You know how many times I have brought it to You and how deeply it matters to me.

Teach me how to wait without becoming consumed by what has not happened yet.

Help me recognize Your goodness in the life You have given me today. Strengthen my heart when waiting becomes difficult. Keep me close enough to hear Your guidance and willing enough to follow it.

I trust that You see what I cannot see. I trust Your wisdom. I trust Your love for me.

And most of all, Father, I want to trust You—not only for the answer, but because You are my God.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

MOMENT: I may still be waiting for the answer, but I am not waiting alone.

Pause. Pray. Trust. Keep walking with Him.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

🌸 What Am I Still Holding?

Scripture

“Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts.” — Psalm 139:23 (KJV)

There are prayers I can pray rather easily.

“Lord, protect my family.”

“Lord, guide me.”

“Lord, open the right doors.”

“Lord, bless the people I love.”

But there is another prayer that feels different.

Lord, show me what I have not surrendered to You.

That has been on my heart.

Not what someone else needs to change.
Not what I wish God would fix around me.

What am I still holding?

Because I can love God, pray, read His Word, serve, encourage other people—and still have places in my life where my hands are tightly closed.

Sometimes it is a person.

We say we have given our children to God, but we are still trying to control every decision, protect them from every consequence and write the ending of their story.

Sometimes it is a marriage or another family relationship. We have already decided what healing should look like, what the other person needs to do and how God needs to fix it.

Sometimes it is work. We ask God to lead while quietly hoping He leads us exactly where we have already decided we want to go.

And sometimes what we are holding is not something precious.

Sometimes it is something God has already been asking us to put down.

The eating habits we keep excusing.

The relationship we know does not honor Him.

The need to stay busy because being still makes us uncomfortable.

The conversation that becomes gossip, even though we called it concern.

The resentment we keep rehearsing.

The need to be right.

The need to be needed.

The need to control.

And perhaps that is why surrender can be so difficult.

We usually have a reason for holding on.

Fear.

Love.

Comfort.

Loneliness.

Habit.

Pride.

Uncertainty.

Sometimes we are afraid of what God might ask us to release. Sometimes we are afraid of what will happen once we no longer have our hands on it.

But surrender is not telling God something He does not already know.

It is opening our hands before the One who already knows what is in them.

I am learning that surrender is not one grand prayer we pray once and never have to revisit.

There are things I gave God yesterday that I reached for again this morning.

So perhaps today's prayer does not need to be complicated.

Father, show me my closed hands.

Show me where I am asking You to lead while still insisting on my own way.

Show me what I have renamed, justified or become comfortable carrying.

Show me the people and outcomes I am trying to control.

And give me enough trust in You to loosen my grip.

Not because I do not care.

Because I believe You care even more.

🌸 The MOMENT

Take a quiet minute today and ask yourself:

What am I still holding that I need to surrender to God?

Do not answer for your spouse.

Do not answer for your child.

Do not answer for the person whose choices have been frustrating you.

Answer for you.

Then take it to your Father exactly as it is.

You do not need polished words.

You may simply need an open hand.

🙏 Prayer

Father, I surrender to You what I have been trying to manage without You, what I have been afraid to release to You, and what I already know You have asked me to put down. Search my heart. Show me what I cannot see and what I have chosen not to see. Teach me to trust You with my children, my marriage, my relationships, my work, my habits, my desires, my future—and myself. I do not want to give You only the parts of my life that are easy to surrender. I want You to have all of me. Help me open my hands. In Jesus' name, Amen.

MOMENT: Surrender is not caring less. It is trusting God more.

Pause. Pray. Open your hands. Trust.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸KNOWN

For the woman who wonders whether anyone really sees her

Scripture: Genesis 16:13 (NKJV)
“You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees.”

You can be needed by a lot of people and still feel known by almost no one.

People may know what you do for them.
They know that you will answer the phone.
They know you will remember the birthday, check on the family, make the appointment, solve the problem, pray the prayer, show up when somebody needs you.

But sometimes you wonder:

Does anyone know me?

Not the capable version.
Not the woman who keeps everything moving.
Not the person everyone assumes is fine.

Me.

The woman who gets tired.
The woman who sometimes feels left out.
The woman who has things she does not know how to explain.
The woman who wishes somebody would notice without having to be told.

There is something especially painful about feeling unseen while surrounded by people.

You can sit at a table and feel alone.

You can belong to a family and still feel misunderstood.

You can serve in church, work with people every day, have contacts in your phone and names in your social media feed—and still long for one person who seems to understand what is happening inside you.

Hagar knew something about that.

Her story in Genesis 16 is complicated and painful. She found herself in circumstances she did not choose, mistreated, overwhelmed and eventually alone in the wilderness.

And it was there—in a place where she probably felt forgotten—that God met her.

What moves me most is the name Hagar gave Him:

“You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees.”

She did not simply discover a God who knew where she was geographically.

She discovered a God who saw her.

Her circumstances.
Her hurt.
Her fear.
Her future.

Her.

And I think some of us need that reminder.

God does not only know the polished version of you.

He knows the thought you stopped yourself from saying.

He knows why something hurt more than you admitted.

He knows why you have been quieter lately.

He knows the relationship you wish were different.

He knows the friendship you miss.

He knows what it feels like to be the one who checks on everybody else and sometimes wonders who would notice if you became quiet.

He knows the parts of your story other people misunderstood.

And you do not have to explain yourself perfectly before He understands.

That may be one of the safest things about being with God.

You do not have to perform being okay.

You can sit with Him without preparing the right words.

You can say, Father, I am lonely.

I feel overlooked.

I do not think they understand me.

I am tired of always being the strong one.

I do not even know exactly what I am feeling today.

And none of that makes Him pull away.

This is the Father who already knows.

There are times when God will bring people into our lives who see us well, and those relationships are gifts. We should make room for friendship, community and honest connection.

But even the people who love us most will sometimes misunderstand us.

They are human.

They cannot see every layer.

God can.

And perhaps that is where some healing begins—not in convincing everybody else to finally understand us, but in becoming more comfortable sitting with the One who already does.

Being known by God does not mean loneliness never hurts.

It means loneliness is not evidence that you have been forgotten.

Being overlooked by people does not make you invisible.

Being misunderstood does not change what God knows to be true about you.

And a quiet season does not mean He has stopped paying attention.

Maybe today you do not need to figure anything out.

Maybe this is simply a MOMENT to sit with your Father and let yourself be known.

No long prayer.

No perfect devotional thought.

Just:

“Father, here I am.”

And perhaps for today, that is enough.

A MOMENT to Reflect

Where in my life have I been feeling unseen or misunderstood lately?

Give yourself room to write without trying to make the answer sound spiritual.

Then simply pray:

Father, thank You for seeing me completely. Help me become comfortable bringing the real me into Your presence. When I feel overlooked, lonely or misunderstood, remind me that I am never unknown to You. Teach me to recognize Your presence and Your love even in the quiet places. Amen.

🌸 MOMENT

You may feel overlooked without being unseen.
You may feel misunderstood without being unknown.
Your Heavenly Father knows you—and He still draws near.

Pause. Pray. Be honest. Let yourself be known.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸Start Where You Are

📖 Scripture

“The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.”
— Psalm 34:18

🌸 MOMENT Reflection

Start Where You Are

Sometimes life changes before we are ready for it.

Someone we love dies. A relationship changes. A job ends. A child grows up and needs us differently. Our health, responsibilities, family, finances or plans take a turn we did not expect.

And suddenly, here we are.

That is when the words “begin again” can start to feel different.

They sound hopeful. And they can be.

But telling someone to begin again can feel like a lot when they are still trying to understand what just happened.

A woman who has lost her husband may not be thinking about her “next chapter.” She may be wondering how she is supposed to walk into the house without him.

Someone grieving a parent may be discovering that it does not matter how old you are—you can still feel the absence of being someone's child.

A caregiver whose life has revolved around someone else's needs may not even know what she needs anymore.

And sometimes there has been no major tragedy at all. You just know something has changed.

So maybe beginning again does not always start with a plan.

Maybe it starts with telling the truth about where you are.

God, I am tired.

God, I miss them.

God, I thought my life would look different.

God, I do not know what to do next.

God, I am grateful...and I am still hurting.

Those prayers count too.

Psalm 34:18 does not say God is near only after the brokenhearted have recovered. It says He is near to the brokenhearted.

Right there.

In the middle of it.

I think sometimes we put pressure on ourselves to turn difficult experiences into lessons too quickly. We start looking for the testimony before we have even had time to acknowledge the pain.

But God does not need us to rush.

There are seasons when faith looks like moving forward.

And there are seasons when faith looks like getting out of bed, doing what needs to be done, whispering a prayer and trusting God with the rest of the day.

That is still faith.

Maybe you are standing at the beginning of something you did not choose.

You do not have to erase what came before.

You do not have to know where this is going.

And you certainly do not have to pretend that you are ready when you are not.

Start where you are.

Because you are not starting from nothing.

You are starting from here.

And God is here too.

Take a MOMENT

Before you think about what comes next, ask yourself:

Where am I—really—right now?

What has changed?

What am I carrying?

What do I miss?

What am I afraid to say out loud?

And what do I need from God today—not next month, not next year, but today?

A Prayer

Lord,

You know exactly where I am.

You know what has changed, what I am carrying, what I miss and what I still do not understand.

Help me not to rush myself just because the world keeps moving.

Meet me here.

Give me what I need for today, and when it is time to take another step, help me take it with You.

Amen.

MOMENT: You do not have to be ready for a new beginning to begin.
You are not starting from nothing. You are starting from here.

Pause. Pray. Be honest. Begin.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org

🌸What If You Are Already Living Your Purpose?

Scripture

“For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”
— Ephesians 2:10

THE MOMENT

I have been thinking about purpose lately.

We hear so much about finding our purpose.

What was I created to do?
Am I using my gifts?
Am I making a difference?
Am I doing what God wants me to do with my life?

Those are good questions.

But I wonder if sometimes we make purpose sound like this one big thing hidden somewhere in the future—and if we pray hard enough, plan carefully enough, or finally get our lives together, God will reveal it.

A career.

A ministry.

A business.

A book.

A platform.

Something with a name attached to it.

But what if some of our purpose is much closer than that?

What if we are already living pieces of it?

Maybe purpose was the child you stayed up with last night.

Maybe it was the friend you called because something told you to check on her.

Maybe it was doing your job well when nobody was applauding.

Maybe it was caring for an aging parent when you would rather have been doing something else.

Maybe it was apologizing to your child.

Starting over.

Praying for somebody who will never know you prayed.

Using something you have learned through your own difficult season to make somebody else's road a little easier.

None of those things may ever appear in a biography.

But that does not make them insignificant.

PURPOSE DOES NOT ALWAYS COME WITH A TITLE

I think sometimes we confuse purpose with position.

We think we will finally be walking in our purpose when we get the job, launch the ministry, finish the degree, publish the book, start the organization, or reach some milestone we've been working toward.

And God certainly can use all of those things.

But Scripture says we are God’s workmanship, created for good works He prepared for us to walk in.

I love that Scripture describes it as a walk.

Not arrive.

Not achieve.

Not become famous for.

Walk.

That sounds much more like a life than a destination.

Maybe purpose is something God unfolds as we keep walking with Him.

Some seasons may be very visible.

Others may feel painfully ordinary.

And some seasons may leave us wondering, What in the world am I doing with my life?

But an ordinary season is not necessarily a purposeless one.

MAYBE THE QUESTION CHANGES

Instead of always asking:

“God, what is my purpose?”

Maybe sometimes we ask:

“God, what is my purpose here?”

Here—in this season.

Here—in this home.

Here—in this workplace.

Here—in this relationship.

Here—with these gifts.

Here—with what I have learned.

Here—with the person You have placed in front of me today.

Because I am beginning to believe that purpose is not only about what we accomplish.

It is also about who we become while God is using us.

The patience we develop.

The compassion we gain.

The wisdom we can now share because we've lived through something.

The courage it took to begin again.

The faith we learned when nothing made sense.

Even the detours can become useful in God's hands.

AND PURPOSE CAN CHANGE SHAPE

This matters too.

What God called you to do at 25 may not look exactly like what He is asking of you at 45, 55, or 75.

Motherhood changes.

Careers change.

Relationships change.

Our bodies change.

Our responsibilities change.

Doors close.

Other doors open.

And sometimes the thing that once gave our lives tremendous meaning ends.

That can leave us wondering:

Who am I now?

But perhaps the end of an assignment is not the end of our usefulness.

God is not finished with us simply because a season is finished.

There may still be something to learn.

Something to give.

Someone to encourage.

Someone to teach.

Something to create.

Something to repair.

Something to begin.

Or perhaps, for a while, something to simply be present for.

A MOMENT TO THINK ABOUT

Maybe you don't need to figure out the rest of your life today.

Maybe you don't need a five-year plan for your purpose.

Look at what is already in your hands.

Your experiences.

Your gifts.

Your relationships.

Your story.

Even the parts you would never have chosen.

Then ask:

“Lord, how can You use what I have, where I am, in this season?”

The answer may eventually lead somewhere you never imagined.

But today?

It may simply lead you to the person standing right in front of you.

MOMENT PRAYER

Lord,

Sometimes I spend so much time wondering what I am supposed to do with my life that I miss what You are doing in my life right now.

Help me recognize purpose even when it looks ordinary.

Show me how to use what You have placed in my hands—my gifts, experiences, lessons, relationships, and even the difficult parts of my story.

When one season ends, help me trust You with what comes next.

And when I cannot see the whole plan, give me enough faith to be faithful in the part You have given me today.

Use my life in ways that matter, even when no one else sees them.

Amen.

Your MOMENT

Where might you already be living out your purpose without calling it “purpose”?

THIS WEEK'S MOMENT CHALLENGE

Don't try to figure out your entire calling this week.

Instead, each morning ask:

“God, what have You given me to do today—and who have You given me an opportunity to serve?”

Then pay attention.

The answer may not look impressive.

Do it anyway.

Because perhaps purpose isn't something we're supposed to spend our whole lives chasing.

Maybe it is something we discover while faithfully living the life God has placed in front of us.

Pause. Pray. Notice. Walk.

❤️ Every MOMENT Matters.

— Monica Lynne Wilkins
MOMENT Moms™
MOMENTMoms.org