In an effort to reach out to single mothers in the Body of Christ, Crosswalk is posting a series of articles by Hope & Help for the Single Mom based on their CD set 21 Principles of a Healthy Single Mom. For more information visit: www.hope4singlemoms.com.
Some thing change and some things remain the same when you become a single mom. What changes? You are responsible for raising your child on your own with God. As you well know, many things change in your life when you become a single mother. What does not change though when you become a single mother is that you are still a woman. That will never change. God gave women such a beautiful role when He designed us, and that is something that we are to cherish and live out to the fullest, regardless of our earthly position in marriage.
God's design for a woman is to love and serve God first and for most. God is your husband during this season of being a single mother, so enjoy Him, honor Him, love Him and serve Him. Get up early in the morning and have conversation and coffee with Him before the children get up. Make yourself up and look presentable at all times for God. After all, he is right there with you all the time trying to enjoy you. Keep the house up for Him, just as you would for an earthly husband. Is your house clean and tidy? Are you preparing meals for "your husband" and your children? Is the laundry done? How about the finances? Are you tithing your money like God is asking you too? Are you living on a budget and being a good steward of Gods finances? What about your job? Are you being a faithful servant of the work God gave for you to do to provide for your family? Where are you at in purity with men? Are you living a life like you are married to God, or are you having an affair on Him?
How are you managing your time? Are you being diligent about Gods business taking care of your relationship with Him? Are you spending quality time with your children in prayer and teaching them the word of God. Are there other single moms in your situation that could use some encouragement from you? Or are you watching meaningless things on TV and gossiping on the phone? Are you and the children involved in your church and creating relationships with other families to spend time with for a healthy foundation in your home? Or are you spending your time alone, allowing Satan to attack?
Seasons in life come and go. Your being a single mom right now is a season, you may not be a single mom for the rest of your life, but you will always be a mother and you will always be a woman. Enjoy the life long treasures that God has given you as a woman. Understand them, cultivate them in your life, and be a living example for the woman that you would want your daughter to become or the kind of woman that you would want your son to marry. Enjoy and live out to the fullest the beautiful gift that God gave you in making you a woman.
Lori Little, A Woman By Design ministry's founder, is the former Director of John C. Maxwell's THRiVE!, Becoming A Woman Of Influence. A major focus of Lori's ministry is the Hope and Help for the Single Mom initiative. Watch for Lori's book Hope and Help for the Single Mom, by Waterbrook Press, in 2005.
21 Principles of a Healthy Single Mom offers meaningful messages, helpful advice and loving encouragement for every single mom. To inquire about and order the CD packages, call 1-888-430-HOPE, or visit the website at: www.hope4singlemoms.com.
Dr. Charles Stanley says of the 21 Principles:
"If a single mom will follow these 21 Principles, there is no way for her to fail. She will watch herself grow in her own strength and abilities and become more confident as the leader of her home.
The 21 Principles of a Healthy Single Mom is a practical asset for single mothers to apply specific, workable, successful guidelines to her life."