Today’s devotion
I am struck this morning by a few verses from Psalm 68. Verses 5-6 says: Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation. God settles the solitary in a home, he leads out the prisoners to prosperity, but the rebellious dwell in a parched land. And verse 10 says: in your goodness, O God, you provided for the needy. While many of you are still married or separated, you might not think of yourselves as widows. However, I think that if you have been abandoned by your husband by him breaking the marriage covenant by not leaving and cleaving to you and by not uniting to you as one flesh, then functionally, you are a widow and these verses do apply to you. A person does not need to leave the home to abandon the marriage covenant. A person can break the marriage covenant by habitually abandoning his wife emotionally and spiritually as well as physically. Instead of showing allegiance to his wife, he is allegiant to other things in his life. This allegiance could be to an addiction, another person, or even to himself. This happens when his desires and wants are consistently the only ones considered. Your desires are not important; only his are. You feel alone and abandoned even if he has never left the home and never intends to leave the home.
While I know that you do not want to think of yourselves as widows or your children as being fatherless…you got married and had children with the hope and promise of raising your children and nurturing your marriage in unity with your husband. But God knew what would happen. And he knew that he would be the ultimate father of your children and he would be your protector. He promises to settle you in a home, and he also promises to provide for your needs. Go to Him in prayer and ask for these things!
P.S. If this idea of breaking the marriage covenant is a new concept for you, I encourage you to go to our website at beautyfromashesministries.org and read our Position on Divorce found in helpful resources. Let me know if you have any questions about it.
