How do I help my daughter see it is not good to be jealous of friends who are having babies out of wedlock?
Question:
I am so concerned about my daughter who is in her early twenties and still lives with us. She is a faithful Christian, has kept herself pure, and tries to be what God wants her to be. However, she has seen a couple of her Christian friends choose the wrong path and ended up unwed and pregnant, or wed then divorced and pregnant. She just learned of another friend who has ended up the same way, and she is very frustrated. She was in tears tonight talking to her dad and me about how she would love to be married and have a baby. She also told us that she's distressed because she feels a little jealous that these girls have what she wants so badly and they aren't faithful Christians. She feels like they are getting rewarded for their unfaithfulness. I know she doesn't want to be in the same predicament as these girls, she just needs to know that she is doing the right thing by following God in keeping herself pure. My husband told her that how she was feeling wasn't new to the righteous. He read to her Psalms 73. We really tried to assure her that she is pleasing God and she will be glad that she followed God in the end. Can you suggest any other scriptures that will help to encourage her?
Answer:
I would suggest pointing out that her friends don't have what she wants. She wants to be married and have children. Her friends have babies but they aren't married. She is so focused on one thing that she is overlooking how miserable their lives are at the moment and how tough those lives will continue to be as the children get older. The babies aren't really rewards, they are burdens which they now have no one to share it with. If anything, I really feel sorry for the babies. They are going to grow up in broken homes because of the foolishness of their parents.
"Surely I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocence. For all day long I have been plagued, and chastened every morning. If I had said, "I will speak thus," behold, I would have been untrue to the generation of Your children. When I thought how to understand this, it was too painful for me -- until I went into the sanctuary of God; then I understood their end. Surely You set them in slippery places; You cast them down to destruction" (Psalms 73:13-18).
Talk about what life is going to be like for the child, spending half time with mom and half time with dad and never really feeling like one place or the other is home. Talk about what the mom's life is like having to have her baby gone part of the time to be with the guy who no longer likes her. Talk about how the mom is going to support herself and the child, meaning that someone has to be with the child while she works.
"Mark the blameless man, and observe the upright; for the future of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together; the future of the wicked shall be cut off" (Psalms 37:37-38).
Psalms 37 makes a good companion to Psalms 73.
The focus is to find a good husband so that when the children come there will be a father there for them. And she can set an example for the younger girls about how successful God's ways are.
Response:
Thank you again for your response. My daughter is feeling better. She just gets so frustrated thinking that the unrighteous seem to be rewarded. I guess we all feel that way at times until we put things in perspective.
