If you told me ten years ago that I would sit down to dinner multiple nights a week with my husband at one end of the table and my daughter’s biological father at the other, I would have called you crazy. The list of reasons why this would have been laughable was quite long. However, the list of reasons that makes this possible is quite short. It was, and is, all God. Let me explain.
In 2012, I found myself far from Christ—wandering and trying to find contentment in the world. Convinced that I could manage without surrendering to Jesus, I found myself pregnant by a man I had only been dating for a couple months. Soon, I was preparing to be a single mother. It was during this “rock bottom” that the Lord called me back to Him in a miraculous way. I surrendered my life, my future, and my child to Him, trusting that He would carry me through what promised to be a scary and unpredictable time. I wish I could say everything was smooth sailing after that. Instead, I got hit with custody papers. The panic, fear, and absolute dread that fell over me was overwhelming. How could I possibly share my precious child with a man I considered (at the time) to be my enemy? I quickly learned that surrender isn’t a one-time action, but a daily decision.
In the middle of the mess, I met a man who would later become my husband, but at the time, was a college kid discovering what spiritual leadership looked like in the midst of relational chaos. This bright-eyed Bible college student, who had faced very little adversity in his life, was now face-to-face with the practical consequences of my impulsivity. As I struggled with fear and worry, he struggled with defensiveness and anger. The result was the same for both of us, however—hatred of my daughter’s biological father.
Putting distance between us didn’t help as much as we had hoped. Shortly after my daughter was born, my husband and I moved two states away. This caused us to revamp our custody agreement, and one can imagine the negative emotions that came from that. Not only had we upset my daughter’s father, but now we had to send her back to him one weekend a month—five hours away from us. The months we spent driving back and forth became harder and harder. My husband and I constantly prayed for peace with this court-ordered decision, because we knew we needed to comply. The drop offs became more awkward, and the older she got, the more she would protest leaving, which led to great anxiety for her and myself. My husband and I had no choice but to rely on God’s strength to guide us through these long weekends. We had to surrender how we felt towards this man, not only on the surface, but in our hearts. And as we began to surrender, we started to pray for him. We prayed for his salvation, we prayed for his family, and we prayed that God would do the unimaginable. Despite it being difficult, we began to feel genuine love that only God can provide. Our circumstances didn’t get any easier, but we began to feel peace and freedom because we knew that He was in control.
Meanwhile, without our knowledge, God was working in my daughter’s father’s life. He probably didn’t feel it at the time as separate circumstances brought him to rock bottom. But God used his difficulty to begin changing his heart. He called me one day out of the blue, sharing his struggles with me and saying he wanted to be more involved in our daughter’s life. But what really stood out is that he said he wanted to find the joy that my husband and I possessed. And rather than expecting our daughter to come to him, he made the decision to start coming to see us once a month. It was during a visit one Easter that this man not only surrendered his life to Christ but asked my husband to baptize him. This day was absolutely beautiful. It was an answer to every tear-filled prayer that we agonized over. I can happily say that since that day, I have never seen someone run so hard after Christ. The joy he experienced in his surrender was contagious, and we knew that God had moved mountains for us.
Not long after that Easter weekend, he chose to move to Florida. As if God hadn’t proven himself to me enough by this point, I panicked. I was filled with worry that he would now want 50/50 custody because he was closer. Having him move near us was a wonderful decision for our daughter, but it had the potential to stir things up again. However, God was busy reminding me that the freedom in surrendering to Him would never disappoint. I began to focus on the opportunities my daughter would have to build a stronger bond with him.
Surrender drew me back to Christ. Surrender caused my husband and I to love someone we thought unlovable. Surrender changed our daughter’s father’s life. But God still wasn’t done teaching us all the beauty and freedom of trusting Him.
When our daughter was almost two, my husband I and welcomed our son into the world. And as both kids grew older, we began to run into new issues that may seem small now but seemed earthshattering at the time. Who does our daughter call “dad,” the man she lives with or her biological father? Will our kids feel like siblings, or will there always be a barrier between them because they have different dads? How much time will our daughter go live with her biological father and how will that affect our son? Co-parenting is not for the faint of heart. It has the potential to introduce anxiety and worry into simple decisions. It’s easy to assume one another’s intentions, fearing worst-case scenarios on a daily basis. But surrendering to the Lord means trusting Him above all else (Proverbs 3:5-6), so whenever those things begin to creep in, we sit down and pray through them together.
Today, our family consists of five people: me, my husband, our son, our daughter, and her father. We make decisions, wrestle through problems, and pursue the Lord together. And yes, we all gather for dinner a couple nights a week.
Our story has a happy ending, but what about all those stories that are still in progress? I have many friends who are attempting to co-parent with abrasive exes. More than one of them have asked me, “When is God going to radically change my person’s heart?” I would love to say there is a formula—that all you have to do is surrender and God will always make everything better, but that’s not the case. What I can say is that surrender to an almighty God is the only way to experience freedom, peace, and joy despite difficult circumstances, that praying for people makes it impossible to hate them, and that you have no idea how God could be using your Christlike love to change the hurting hearts of those who don’t know Him.
Written by: Autumn Steier. Autumn and her husband, Andrew, live in Jacksonville, Florida with their two kids. She and her husband run an amazing ministry called Always Going where they teach people all over the country about discipleship and how to share your faith. Their life is inspiring on and off the stage. Autumn also loves to read, work in her garden, and hang out with her chickens. She is currently homeschooling her children but also holds a masters degree in counseling.
