VOICE OF TRUTH FOR TODAY
Monica’s Story
Monica knew the heartbreak of watching someone she loved walk far from God.
Growing up in fourth-century North Africa, she learned about Jesus as a young girl and became a devoted follower. Although she later married a pagan Roman official, she raised her children in the Christian faith. Her son Augustine, however, eventually rejected what she had taught him.
As a young man, Augustine pursued pleasure, sexual sin, worldly success, and a philosophy that rejected Christianity. Monica was heartbroken. She begged a pastor to speak with him, but the pastor recognized Augustine wasn’t ready to listen.
His advice was simple: Keep praying. And she did.
She prayed when Augustine fathered a child outside marriage. She prayed as he pursued fame and fortune. She prayed when he deceived her and moved away without telling her. She prayed through years when there seemed to be absolutely no evidence that anything was changing.
Eventually, something did.
Augustine became dissatisfied with the philosophy he had embraced and came under the teaching of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan. Then one day, God’s Word pierced his heart through Romans 13:13–14, calling him away from drunkenness, sexual immorality, fighting, and jealousy and toward Jesus Christ.
Augustine surrendered—and eventually became one of Christianity’s most influential theologians and philosophers.
But before there was Augustine the theologian, there was Monica the mother who would not stop praying. Jesus taught His disciples that they “should always pray and never give up” (Luke 18:1, NLT). Perhaps someone you love seems impossibly far from God today. You may have prayed for years and seen little evidence of change.
Monica’s story reminds us that we cannot see what God may be doing beneath the surface.
Keep loving. Keep believing. And above all—Keep praying.
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Excerpt from Voice of Truth Magazine
“Power Points: God at Work through Women Leaders Yesterday and Today” by Leecy Barnett