30 Days of Prayer & Praise 2023

Pray for Care of Children –

Thank you for joining us on these 30 days of prayer. This week we are focusing our prayers on the Care of Children.

We are asking you to join us in asking God to advance the vision of Every Child Loved and Nurtured in a Christ-centered Family. This is a big vision, especially in today’s culture where there is considerable opposition to the natural family, and to Christ.

Reported by the Annie E. Casey Foundation in their 2023 Kids Count annual report, Arizona ranks 39th out of 50 states in overall child well-being. Children’s brains develop connections faster in the first five years than at any other time in their lives. Early childhood is when the foundations for learning, health, and behavior are established that impact a child’s well-being into adulthood.

We started Family Care KIDS, an early childhood learning center because it is considered by some as today’s foster care. For many families in our community, childcare centers are their children’s primary caregivers. And for children experiencing adverse experiences at home, it is their only hope for their future development and success. Their only hope of a stable environment. What happens in these first five years of development sets the trajectory for their lifetime? Ask God to:

• Since our founding, we have served pregnant mothers, providing counseling and support services to parents concerned about the well-being of their children and their desire for them to live a better future. Ask God to:
• Grow our ability to help young mothers thrive by partnering them with mentors and host families from our STRONG Families program.
• Provide host families willing to take young birth mothers into their homes.

We started Family Care Learning to equip parents providing care to foster and adoptive children. Wanting to prevent child disruptions, we started training caregivers on the effects of childhood trauma on brain development and behaviors, and how to best help all thrive. Now, as a resource to Family Care KIDS, we want to expand our training to help community parents, who did not have a healthy parenting role model become better parents. Ask God to:

• Resource the cost of developing a curriculum that serves the needs of community families.
• Use the courses developed for CFC foster and adoptive families to encourage other families nationally.
• The courses will empower families and caregivers to thrive in parenting and prevent children and families from being disrupted.

According to a nationwide survey conducted by Communio, fatherlessness is a root cause of the decline in Christianity over the past 40 years. When marriage collapses, church attendance collapses. And the social institution designed to nurture and love children collapses along with it. Today, our children are being raised in environments of fear, anxiety, sexual confusion, and addictions.

Achieving our mission of ‘strengthening families and serving at-risk children in the name of Jesus Christ’ is a struggle as we compete against the forces of culture that have abandoned a biblical worldview of the family. Please join us in praying for the care of the children.

Next week our focus of prayer is on Child Well-being.

Pray for Child Well-being –

This week our focus of prayer is centered on the well-being of children in Arizona. Child well-being is generally understood to be the measure of the quality of a child’s life.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services measures child well-being by considering factors of physical health, safety, mental health, emotional development, education, learning, relationships, and social behavior.

In the Anne E. Casey Foundations, 2023 Kids Count Data Book, Arizona ranks #39 out of 50 states in overall child well-being as measured across four domains: (1) Economic Well-Being, (2) Education, (3) Health, and (4) Family and Community.

Marriage is the most important factor in determining the economic well-being of children. Arizona ranks 42^nd of the 50 states. Researchers are stating that the rise in cohabitation is the largest threat to the quality and stability of children’s family lives. Intact families provide the best advantage to lift families and children into a state of well-being for human flourishing.

Marriage alone is not the remedy for improving the well-being of children in Arizona. However, marriage is a strong predictor of a child’s psychological and social welfare. Poverty is a better predictor of educational attainment. Yet, marriage influences men’s careers and financial attainment, therefore influencing the ability of households to rise out of poverty.

Patrick Fagan, Ph.D. of the Marriage, and Religion Research Institute in his research points out that the median income for married, intact families, is 2-3 times more than cohabiting, divorces, or never-married families. Also, faith advocates for a standard of morality in a marriage that encourages stability, which affects productivity, savings, and income.  

Here are some of the challenges we are facing in Arizona.

• As reported by the Arizona Department of Child Safety, only 4% of adoptive parents are married (49% divorced, 47% single); and 40% of children are adopted by non-relatives (foster parents or non-relatives).
• The ability of Arizona’s children to succeed is being diminished by the vicious cycle of crime, violence, teenage pregnancy, drug use, and gang involvement, all a result of breakdown in family, and absent fathers. Statistically, intact families (mother/father) succeed in leaving poverty and entering middle class.
• The increase in the depth of emotional and behavioral problems of today’s children is affecting the ability to recruit and retain foster and adoptive parents.

How to pray… Ask God to:

• Mobilize Christian two-parent families to adopt foster children. I am challenged with attempting to get the Arizona government to focus on improving the well-being of children by placing kids in two-parent homes when we don’t have enough two-parent families willing to engage.
• Grow the number of men willing to mentor young men in foster care preparing for adulthood so that we can prepare a generation of men who will seek marriage, and build intact, stable family structures for a new generation of children.  
• Grow the impact of CFC in building a model of prevention services that help to open acceptance to the gospel message and faith in Christ, stabilize families, and encourage men to embrace their roles as fathers in leading their families.
• Ignite an energetic acceptance of people in Arizona’s at-risk communities to embrace the ministries of CFC as resources of God’s lovingkindness to help lift them into a life of human flourishing.
• Provide the people and economic resources to bypass government and once again demonstrate to the community that CFC, the Christian church, and Christians united is the best place for hurting people in our communities to build relationships that lead to hope and personal well-being for themselves, their children, and ultimately for the welfare of the State of Arizona. All to the glory of God.

Pray for Visible Christian Witness –

This week, I invite you to pray by asking God to grow the visible witness of his glory, working through CFC and our church partners in the community we serve throughout Arizona.

Ephesians 5 encourages us to be imitators of God, to walk in love, to be the light. The evil prevalent in society today is as different from good as light is from darkness. As Christians, if we stand visible in the community, our light will produce in people quite the opposite effect as those who walk in darkness apart from Christ.

Historically, faith and family have been the greatest influencers on the well-being of societies.

Dream with me for a moment. What if our child welfare systems, early childhood and local school systems, and major employers in Arizona knew that Christian Family Care and its church partners are the first place willing to help families and children in crisis?

What if Christians set the standards of care, love, and compassion and we, the Church, were once again the go-to source that people sought for help?

Would our visibility then become a beacon of light that brings about change, enabling children, families, and the cities of Arizona to thrive?

I believe God is the only one that can change the trajectory of darkness and destruction our society is heading in as values are destroyed and marriages and families continue to be tossed aside. I also believe God wants to do something big through CFC that will restore our communities, prevent further decay, and cause every child and family to thrive.

There is a strong divide in our country as to how large a role the government should play in orchestrating the moral standards and values of society. One thing most people agree on however is that the government is not a good parent.

A new study on faith and relationships suggests that absent fathers and collapsed marriages might be two of the best explanations for why Christianity is declining in the United States.

The Nationwide Study on Faith and Relationships, research recently released by the church-consulting organization Communio, reports that “family decline appears to fuel faith decline.” Fatherlessness, it turns out, doesn’t just lead to poor outcomes on social indexes, research revealed. It has profound spiritual consequences too. When marriage collapses, church attendance collapses. And the social institution designed to nurture and love children collapses with it.

Pray with us by asking God to:

• Use the relationships the CFC team and board members have with DCS, school systems, and government leaders to influence acceptance of biblical marriage and moral values in serving at-risk community children and families.
• Show you how you can partner with CFC as a light, in a culture of darkness, to advance a visible witness of Christ’s love in your area of influence to help children and families thrive.
• That the ministry efforts of CFC will be fruitful in producing everything that is wholesome and good and true (Eph. 5), that every child and family we serve will flourish.
• Awaken the hearts of people in our communities to receive the light, and the love of Christ, and cast aside the darkness in values being permeated by our cultural leaders. Restoring marriage as the standard for thriving families and communities.
• Grow CFC’s services such that our child welfare system, early childhood and local school systems, and major employers in Arizona find CFC to be the first place to go to receive help for families and children in crisis. Preventing disruptions and restoring brokenness.

Next week we will complete our 30 Days Of Prayer focusing on praying for our government leaders.

P.S. I am challenging our CFC Team this next year to Become the Visible Community with emphasis on these four areas – BEST:

• Being a company of Christians fully committed to operating in alignment with Biblical Truth…at whatever personal and/or corporate cost.
• Engaging the community with moral integrity (personal and corporate righteousness) for the purpose of glorifying God.
• Serving the community at large, with excellence and in alignment with Christ’s model of love and truth to others, revealing Jesus Christ who is the source of life.
• Trusting God to open opportunities, provide resources, and make fruitful our work.

Pray for Governing Authorities –

This week I invite you to pray asking God to turn the hearts of our governing leaders to acknowledge the truth that biblical values of faith and family are to be embraced and celebrated as beneficial to prospering societies.

Jeremiah 29:7 “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you…for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”

It wasn’t until 1921 during the Depression and President Roosevelt’s New Deal that the government took on the role of welfare spending. Until then it was primarily the Christian community and charity that cared for children and families in crisis. As we have learned through prior prayer letters, this was the tipping point, where the government started to influence the moral and family values of society. As a friend of mine says, ‘the faith community abdicated its role to the government.”  

Over the years, the government’s influence has both been positive and negative on the well-being of children. In recent times, the government has learned that what is best for kids, is strong families. The Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA) was signed into law in February 2018 as part of the Bipartisan Budget Act (HR. 1892). Its purpose was to turn the focus of the child welfare system toward keeping children safely with their families to avoid the trauma that results when children are placed in out-of-home care. We are starting to see the effects as the number of children in foster care in Arizona is decreasing, which is putting pressure rightly on prevention and restoration of families.

The FFPSA has expanded the need to serve relatives of these children (kinship foster care or relative placement). Many, grandparents who are raising children, providing great opportunity for CFC to utilize its long history of working with foster children to provide support services to wrap around community families with Christ-centered love and compassion. Arizona, as do many other states, provides support services (e.g. mental health, parent skills training, and assistance with children care), the problem is that it advocates a worldview that is anti-faith. By mandating trainings that are secular (void of faith) or pro-LGBTQ+ government is advocating a worldview that is against the Judeo-Christian values that founded America, and not protecting the welfare of Arizona’s children.

Ephesians 6:12 says that we are not in a political battle, but a spiritual battle. “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”

Our STRONG Families program, Mentors program, and Family Care Learning trainings all are designed to address the physical, emotional, and spiritual battle. These programs can impact not only this generation but potentially future generations by working directly with community families in at-risk communities. Our focus is to provide these services without government assistance, as the church once did so that our Christian witness can be untethered from any restraint of advancing a biblical worldview.

Every child deserves an opportunity to flourish in life. We want to help every child, no matter what values their parents or relatives currently hold. As I shared last week, we want to be that visible witness in the community that reflects the unconditional love of Christ, for without Christ these children will remain in darkness, tethered to a traumatic life.

Here is how I would ask you to pray:

• Ask God to guide Governor Hobbs, and our State Legislators, especially Senate President Warren Peterson and House Speaker Ben Toma, and their staff, to enact laws that strengthen the family, and glorify God for the welfare of Arizona’s children.
• Ask God to guide DCS Director Lujan, DES Director Rodger, and Childcare Assistant Director Wendell and their staff for wisdom and discernment in managing the child welfare systems that care for Arizona’s children.
• Ask God to move the Christian community, the Church, to take over the welfare of families once again.
• Pray for the Board of CFC to continue to stand firm, and lead transformation in our communities by advancing a biblical worldview of care and services for the welfare of every child.
• Ask God for a restoration of biblical values in all governing authorities, from local school boards to the White House, so that the hearts of our leaders would align with the heart of God.

This is the last week of our 30 days of prayer. I hope that joining us in this season of prayer has helped you to know better CFC and our mission, and how you can continue to pray for us throughout the year. I also hope that it has encouraged you in your own relationship with God.

As a team, we pray for you and want to thank you for partnering with us in this ministry to strengthen families and serve at-risk children in the name of Jesus Christ.

If you have ideas on ways to grow our influence and services in the community to glorify God, we invite you to share those with us.

We welcome your help in making introductions to church leaders; leaders of local school boards, including social workers, principals, and superintendents in public schools; government leaders, and business leaders that might be open to considering partnerships to help serve employees and families to support preservation of marriage and stabilization of employment due to crisis situations in the home.

As we wrap up these 30 Days of Prayer this week, I will leave you with this quote from an unknown author “Prayer moves the arm, that moves the world, to bring deliverance down.” I hope you will continue to pray for us. If you are interested in continuing to receive updates send us an email at info@cfcare.org and we will keep you connected.

Thank you for praying.