Of Socks, Seat Belts, and Spiritual Warfare: The Christian Mother Prays
I have recognized for years that some of my most fervent prayers happen when I’m running late. This happens far more frequently than I’d like, but it’s also taught me some things about prayer. It sounds like a joke, but it’s not (even if it is somewhat humorous).
Case in point: we’ll be frantically gathering last-minute items, and someone discovers he needs matching socks, usually because we’re heading to school and kids are in uniforms and mismatched socks are verboten, or we’re off to church in more formal attire where fluorescent colors at the ankles are at least a minor fashion faux pas. “Where are your socks?” I’ll yell at the barefoot child, and the predictable “I can’t find any!” wail will follow, this after I’d laid out clean, ironed clothes and then exhorted kids for the last hour to find accompanying accessories.
I’ll growlingly descend to the basement to dig through a laundry basket of clean socks, and I’ll find myself praying. Please, God, help me find a match, I’ll beg over and over while I’m frantically picking up and setting aside blue and striped and well-worn whites, and also wondering how it is we have so. many. socks. And then I’ll find a match! I’ll hurriedly thank God for His guidance, and sprint upstairs.
Something similar has happened with seat belts. I’m almost never adjusting car seats or belts during a calm lull in daily work; it always seems to happen whenever we’re late, or barely running on time, and the process brings us to a screeching halt, or at least takes much longer than what I think it should. I’ve spent far more time battling frustration and sweat with car seats than I care to admit, but such battles have also led me directly, once again, to prayer. Dear Jesus, I’m about to lose it, I’ll pray as I’m wrangling dangling straps or trying to clip them to metal brackets I can’t see or adjusting buckles and straightening belts that seem to have shrunk or widened overnight. The exertion tends to make me perspire and literally heat up, which doesn’t add to my calm, but the prayer always does. Please help me fasten this. And He does, and we’re off—until the next time.
I used to feel guilty about praying such prayers. Why do I bother the God of all creation with such little asks? Socks are practical needs, yes, but also they can lead to vanity (is anyone other than me really going to notice or care if one sock is dark blue and another one is dark blue stripes?). Seat belts can and do save lives, but they also can be an aggravating hassle. In other words, are these things important enough for me to petition my Lord and Savior for his help?
Of course, the short answer is yes. “Pray without ceasing” is clear, and it leaves no room for a human-designed hierarchy of prayer-worthy needs. The longer answer is also yes, but it reminds us of things we prideful people might rather ignore. I’ve learned this. I know God wants to hear my prayers, and when I’ve felt my prayers are a little bit silly, what I’ve also realized is that I’m ashamed. I’m embarrassed that I so often ignore Him only to desperately petition Him in moments of socklessness and seat belt frustration. In other words, I’m guilty because I don’t pray for His help or guidance in most of my life.
I’ve learned in these small prayers, though, that God is not bothered by me. In fact, He cares so deeply for me that He wants to know every single infinitesimal need or confusion or anxiety that I have. And I’ve learned that He provides, even down to socks and seat belts. But this realization requires my humility. If I’m asking Jesus for aid or counsel, I’m also admitting I don’t have the fixes and answers. 1 Peter 5:6-7 explains this succinctly. “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.” I am broken, and I have to admit this precisely so I can receive God’s gifts. Prayer reminds me of who I am: a sinner who desperately needs a Savior outside of myself, and His child whose prayers He desires.
In the last week or so, I saw a news story that most of you likely saw, too. A man, Jordan Neely, suffering from mental illness, was physically restrained on a New York City subway by another man, Daniel Penny. Neely, according to The New York Times, “was homeless and had been screaming at passengers when [Penny] wrapped his arms around Mr. Neely’s neck and head and held him for several minutes until he went limp. Mr. Neely died from compression to his neck as a result of the chokehold,” according to the medical examiner’s spokeswoman.
The typical politicized response has resulted. This makes me sad, because the whole situation seems to beg for collective sadness, both for the seeming inability of Mr. Neely to get or to accept the help he needed prior to his death, and for his unintentional death that Mr. Penny caused in an attempt to protect others, perhaps even from Mr. Neely himself. As Christians, we can mourn for people struggling with terrible demons, and we can mourn for people trying to do what’s right, even when the consequences are also terrible. We can actually grieve for both men, and I think we should.
As a mother, I keep thinking that both Mr. Neely and Mr. Penny are sons. I have five living sons, and I know that the challenges my sons will face in our world are different than the ones my daughters will face. I’m reminded of Monica, the mother of St. Augustine, who prayed and wept for her wayward son’s baptism and conversion for years—nearly two decades—without ceasing. Augustine did finally confess Christ, and he wrote tenderly of his mother’s ardent petitions to God for his sake in his Confessions, as he addressed God.
You put forth your hand from on high, and you drew my soul out of that pit of darkness, when before you my mother, your faithful servant, wept more for me than mothers weep over their children’s dead bodies. By that spirit of faith which she had from you, she saw my death, and you graciously heard her, O Lord. Graciously you hear her, and you did not despise her tears when they flowed down from her eyes and watered the earth beneath, in whatsoever place she prayed (Book III, Chapter 11).
I’ve always been impressed by Monica’s fervent prayers. She embodied the kind of relentless trust in Christ that Augustine so eloquently articulated that we broken humans ultimately desire: “[You] have made us and drawn us to yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.” And when our hearts rest in our eternal God, we trust Him, because we have been brought to know He loves us and wants the best for us absolutely. Then we can pray with complete confidence that He who is faithful will remain faithful to us.
This confidence in Christ and the doggedness it inspires is crucial to praying mothers, especially when our children have fallen away from the faith. It is especially important when the odds seem so stacked, and the challenges so incredible, that no fix seems possible. Spiritual warfare is terrifying, and heartbreaking, and all too real. Christians know it afflicts all of us, because the Devil is crafty and assaults us continually, as we pray in the Litany. This is why we plead with Christ, in the memorable line also in the Litany, “to beat down Satan under our feet.” This is not a prayer of half-measures. And mothers desperate for our children’s earthly repentance and eternal salvation likewise pray with unalloyed intensity. We mean it one hundred percent. And like Monica, we often shed countless tears along the way.
And this is where our God is so gracious. We can be greatly encouraged by mothers like Monica. But our final hope rests in the Person to whom she prayed. Our God has promised to never leave us or forsake us (Joshua 1:5, Hebrews 13:5). He is the One who has done, does, and will do the saving we and our children need.
I’d like to think I will eventually stop being late for things. But if being late means I think about prayer, then I am grateful for that thorn in my flesh to remind me of Christ who is with me even as time runs out. I pray for Him to help me find my children their socks, and to latch their seat belts, and to fight fiercely and ferociously for us against the old evil foe. I keep praying. And you Christian mothers keep praying, too, for He is with us and our children always.