How God Broke the Cycle of Poverty for One Teen Mom

Thirty-six years ago, there was a single, young woman about to give birth. She was young and didn’t know how she could afford a child without her parents’ help. She hadn’t talked to her former boyfriend in months. She had no idea how to reach him. How to tell him she was having his child.

This young woman attended church some, yet her dialogue with God was stilted. How could God let this happen to her? What would her life be like now?

A baby girl was born, and upon holding her child this young lady knew things would be OK. Perhaps this baby was a gift, not a burden as she supposed. So this woman raised her daughter the best she could, and while she wanted to give her child more than she had…

History has a way of repeating itself.

When the daughter became a young woman she found herself in the same situation—living at home, pregnant, scared. The daughter knew she could raise this child. After all, her mom had done it. But what would her life be like? How could God let this happen to her?

If you haven’t guessed already. I was the daughter.

Born to a single mom, as a teenager becoming a single mom myself. At age 17, God gave me a son. My boyfriend was out of the picture, and I faced raising a child alone with little education, no money and maybe, according to the world, little hope for my future.

Now if you take this story at face value, I am nothing more than a statistic.

According to government research, most daughters of young mothers go on to be teen mothers themselves. They face lives of hardship, living on welfare for the most part—becoming a burden rather than an asset to society.

Yet, I am not a statistic. And do you know why I’m not a statistic? Because God doesn’t do them.

Did you hear that?

God doesn’t do statistics. In fact, He likes to blow them out of the water.

You see, God has a history of seeing something that no one else does. Like seeing a king in a shepherd boy named David, seeing an apostle in a young zealot named Saul, and seeing a mighty warrior in a frightened nobody named Gideon.

God has X-ray eyes that see right through any outward characteristics or any national statistics. His X-ray eyes scan down to the heart.

And what did God see? He must have seen something worthwhile. Because . . .