Silas
Beloved of All
Thank you for sharing your heart so openly and for giving thanks even while you are still waiting and praying. It is right to thank God that after more than four months of silence there is now peace and restored time by video with your young son. What God does endures, and when He opens a door for restoration it is a work that lasts. That gratitude honors Him.
Your prayer for your wife and family and for your son reflects what Scripture describes as the work of the Holy Spirit to turn the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom and attitude of the just. That turning is not mere outward change but a work of the heart toward affection and submission to God. You are asking for the wisdom from above that is pure, peaceable, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere, and that is the right prayer. God desires that wisdom to govern your conversations, your decisions about time together, and the way honor is given to fatherhood as He has ordained it.
Scripture calls again and again for repentance because repentance is needed. John came preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins, and people came confessing their sins. Jesus Himself came saying He did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance, for those who are well do not need a physician but those who are sick. In the same way, when Jesus spoke to the churches in Revelation, His call was to repent, to turn and become all He intends His people to be. That same call is for today. The evidence of true conversion is not words alone but repentance that brings change and restoration, a turning away from sin and a turning to God.
When David sinned by taking another man's wife and by taking that man's life, he confessed that his sin was against God, for God had commanded not to commit adultery and not to murder. All sin is ultimately against God who gives His commands so we know right from wrong. That is why your prayer that your wife would see that spite toward you is in truth sin against God, and that she would be hedged in as with thorns so she cannot pursue what is wrong, come to her senses as the prodigal did, and stop sinning so that nothing worse befalls her, is a biblical prayer. God is not mocked. What is sown to the flesh reaps destruction, and the works of the flesh are evident. Those who practice sexual immorality outside the covenant of marriage, and those who love and practice falsehood, are outside the kingdom unless they repent. Marriage is a lifelong covenant of one man and one woman, and intimacy belongs only within it. To seek other relationships or to use dating sites while still married is adultery in God's sight, and it must be repented of. We do not ask God to bless what He calls sin. We ask Him to grant repentance leading to life, for He is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance, and heaven rejoices over one sinner who truly repents.
You are also right to desire that the church, not an unbelieving court, would help bring wisdom and arbitration. It is a shame when disputes among believers are taken before unbelievers when there should be wise ones among God's people able to judge between brothers. Pastors keep watch over souls as those who will give an account, and God desires that such care be given with joy. Pray that those who have spiritual responsibility in her life would speak the truth in love, help her see through deception, confront sin gently, and point her to the gospel which is repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ, as preached from the beginning that all should repent and turn so their sins may be blotted out.
For your son, continue to pray that your time together would put God's will and love first, that he would come to know God as gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and that he would learn to love God with all his heart and to love others. Pray that he would be brought up in the training and instruction of the Lord and that through the Scriptures he would gain the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. Pray also for protection, that both of you would be kept from temptation, from evil people, from the evil one, and from the influence of wicked spirits, and that you would be kept from deception and fear and lies. God is able to use many means to draw a wandering heart back, even leaving the many to seek the one who is lost, so that one who wanders from the truth may be turned back from death to life.
Ask God to help you both hold your tongues, to hold nothing against one another, and to entrust one another into His hands, so that the world is overruled, the flesh is subdued, and the enemy is restrained. Pray for scheduled and monitored time that is calm and orderly, not rushed or distracted, so you can accomplish what God has given you to do and treat your calling as a father with the priority He places on it. Pray that calls would go smoothly and that love would be freely given and received.
May the Lord grant you peace as you wait on Him, continue to conform you to Christ, and bring the deep and lasting change that only repentance and faith in Jesus can bring, for His glory and for the good of your son and your family.
Your prayer for your wife and family and for your son reflects what Scripture describes as the work of the Holy Spirit to turn the hearts of the disobedient to the wisdom and attitude of the just. That turning is not mere outward change but a work of the heart toward affection and submission to God. You are asking for the wisdom from above that is pure, peaceable, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere, and that is the right prayer. God desires that wisdom to govern your conversations, your decisions about time together, and the way honor is given to fatherhood as He has ordained it.
Scripture calls again and again for repentance because repentance is needed. John came preaching a baptism of repentance for the remission of sins, and people came confessing their sins. Jesus Himself came saying He did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance, for those who are well do not need a physician but those who are sick. In the same way, when Jesus spoke to the churches in Revelation, His call was to repent, to turn and become all He intends His people to be. That same call is for today. The evidence of true conversion is not words alone but repentance that brings change and restoration, a turning away from sin and a turning to God.
When David sinned by taking another man's wife and by taking that man's life, he confessed that his sin was against God, for God had commanded not to commit adultery and not to murder. All sin is ultimately against God who gives His commands so we know right from wrong. That is why your prayer that your wife would see that spite toward you is in truth sin against God, and that she would be hedged in as with thorns so she cannot pursue what is wrong, come to her senses as the prodigal did, and stop sinning so that nothing worse befalls her, is a biblical prayer. God is not mocked. What is sown to the flesh reaps destruction, and the works of the flesh are evident. Those who practice sexual immorality outside the covenant of marriage, and those who love and practice falsehood, are outside the kingdom unless they repent. Marriage is a lifelong covenant of one man and one woman, and intimacy belongs only within it. To seek other relationships or to use dating sites while still married is adultery in God's sight, and it must be repented of. We do not ask God to bless what He calls sin. We ask Him to grant repentance leading to life, for He is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance, and heaven rejoices over one sinner who truly repents.
You are also right to desire that the church, not an unbelieving court, would help bring wisdom and arbitration. It is a shame when disputes among believers are taken before unbelievers when there should be wise ones among God's people able to judge between brothers. Pastors keep watch over souls as those who will give an account, and God desires that such care be given with joy. Pray that those who have spiritual responsibility in her life would speak the truth in love, help her see through deception, confront sin gently, and point her to the gospel which is repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ, as preached from the beginning that all should repent and turn so their sins may be blotted out.
For your son, continue to pray that your time together would put God's will and love first, that he would come to know God as gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and that he would learn to love God with all his heart and to love others. Pray that he would be brought up in the training and instruction of the Lord and that through the Scriptures he would gain the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. Pray also for protection, that both of you would be kept from temptation, from evil people, from the evil one, and from the influence of wicked spirits, and that you would be kept from deception and fear and lies. God is able to use many means to draw a wandering heart back, even leaving the many to seek the one who is lost, so that one who wanders from the truth may be turned back from death to life.
Ask God to help you both hold your tongues, to hold nothing against one another, and to entrust one another into His hands, so that the world is overruled, the flesh is subdued, and the enemy is restrained. Pray for scheduled and monitored time that is calm and orderly, not rushed or distracted, so you can accomplish what God has given you to do and treat your calling as a father with the priority He places on it. Pray that calls would go smoothly and that love would be freely given and received.
May the Lord grant you peace as you wait on Him, continue to conform you to Christ, and bring the deep and lasting change that only repentance and faith in Jesus can bring, for His glory and for the good of your son and your family.
