Dear Heavenly Father, You are worthy of all glory, honor, and praise. Your name is holy, and my heart is full as I think of the goodness You have shown me. As a single woman in her 50's, I have experienced a lot. Tears stream from my face to think how You’ve kept me under Your wing through all the dangers and pain I’ve encountered. Thank You for blessing me with loving family and friends to support and comfort me during difficult times. Thank You for steady employment, a lovely home and reliable transportation. Most importantly, thank You for making me Your child through the Lord Jesus Christ. I am so honored and blessed to have a relationship with You, Dear Father.
You are my Creator, Provider, Protector, and Strength. You know me better than I know myself, so I know that I can be honest and keep it real with You, Heavenly Father. Your Word tells us in Philippians 4:6(NLT), “Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.” You don’t want us to have anxiety in our lives about anything. Instead, we must come to You with whatever is on our hearts. You are our Source of all blessings, and You only want what is best for us.
Forgive me, Heavenly Father, because I have not always trusted You the way I should. I have been single longer than I’d like, and because of this, at times I’ve been confused and very sad. Sometimes, I have beat myself up asking what I am doing wrong. I’ve been in relationships that I was sure would lead to marriage. I invested time, resources, and a lot of emotions into them, but things did not turn out as I expected. I have been very hurt and heartbroken because of this. I was raised to be a strong, independent woman, and I didn’t want to appear to be weak, even though I was carrying the pain of these break ups. Please help me, Dear Father, and heal the pain within me so that I do not carry it into my future marriage.
Because of Your love and grace, I now realize that You have a wonderful plan for my life. I also have been committed to learn the lesson that broken relationships can teach a person. One of the most valuable lessons I learned was about tailoring what I should be looking for in a good and Godly partner. I have also learned more about certain attributes within a man that I should not accept.
Lord, you know that loneliness can be a very painful reality. Sometimes, we forget to have faith during those times because being lonely feels so bad. When you finally meet someone that seems nice, you are so relieved not to feel loneliness that you accept qualities and characteristics that are beneath your privilege as a daughter of God. This isn’t what You desire for us. You want us to be confident in Your provision, and You don’t want us making emotional investments in men that are not ordained by You to be our destiny partners. When we leap into love without Your guidance, direction, and greenlight, we make huge mistakes and accept less than our privilege.
One of the other lessons I’ve learned is the importance of being humble and submissive to the right person. You tell us in Colossians 3:18(NLT), “Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting for those who belong to the Lord.” Keeping it real, Lord, this is tough for a lot of us. When it comes to submitting to our destiny partners in a way that pleases You, many of us go overboard. We allow ourselves to be walked over and mistreated. We let men lead us into actions that are against Your Word and injure our relationship with You. Then, some of us go to the complete opposite side of the spectrum. As women, we’ve had to be the head of our households and hold things down for ourselves and families. So, it is very challenging for us to relinquish the kind of control and leadership we’ve had to assume over the years. Please help us, Dear Father. Help us to be confident that when we trust Your presentation of the right person, submitting to them and them submitting to us will be a very beautiful and unifying thing.
You have commanded us to renew our minds, and that is what we must do in the area of submitting ourselves to the man that You have ordained for our lives. Please guide us through Your Spirit to strip off the attributes, attitudes, mindsets, and behaviors that keep us from being the kind of spouse You would have us to be. We must trust that as we humble ourselves before You, we will not be at a disadvantage, because You bless us when we are obedient to the standard of Your Word.
Finally, Dear Father, please help us to “Let go and let God!” This means we must turn the reigns of our quest to meet the right person totally over to Your extremely capable hands. In order for our relationships to last, we must make Jesus Christ the head of our lives and our relationships. We can’t wait until we meet the person and decide to do this. Now is the time. We must make You the focus and center of our lives from the very beginning, even before we meet the person we’re going to marry. This is what You desire, and if we do this—if we seek You first in all that we do, Jesus Christ promises in Matthew 6:33 that You will bless us with the great desires of our hearts. Thank You for all Your wonderful blessings. In the name of our precious and powerful Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! Amen.
Scripture quotations marked (NLT) are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.
“Marriage Preparation Prayer for Women over 50”, written by Penny Brown, edited by Fran Mack for Springfield Fellowship, Inc.©2022. All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord!
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