Be the Prayer They Don’t Have: Interceding for Kids in Crisis

I first learned about Moms in Prayer on Christian radio while a teenager in New Jersey and determined that if God would allow me to marry and have children one day, I wanted to be in a group.

After all, I had a mom who prayed for me. Thankfully, she still does. I don’t take her prayers for granted. That she is alive is a gift from God.

Tragedy struck my sweet, happy family when I was 11 years old. We had just visited our extended family in India when my jetlagged father fell asleep at the wheel on our drive home to New Jersey from JFK airport. With all of us asleep in the car, our sedan veered off the highway, struck a tree, and caught on fire. Soon after impact, I woke up to find my parents unconscious, my siblings unresponsive, and our car in flames. We were trapped. I looked up at the night sky and called out to the only One we can turn to when all seems impossible, whispering a prayer, “God, please help us.”

Soon after impact, I woke up to find my parents unconscious, my siblings unresponsive, and our car in flames.

Psalm 50:15 says, “Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me.”

God, true to Himself, heard my cry that night, and I live to declare His praise. He sent people to rescue my Dad, and siblings and me, from the fire. Mom was trapped in the car with a melted, stuck seatbelt, but God sent an unidentified motorcyclist to pull my mom out of the fire just moments before the car exploded. We believe the motorist was an angel! My Dad tragically died that night from cardiac hemorrhaging, but my mother, despite being burned on a third of her body, was spared and turned to Jesus instead of anything else. I am forever grateful.

Life had many challenges in a single-parent home, but the Lord was our Rock, and prayer was our lifeline. I have lived and learned that prayer is never wasted, and there is power in our agreement.

It’s why I sought out a community of praying moms through Moms in Prayer as soon as my husband and I settled in Texas. For the past 14 years, I have prayed the Scriptures over my four children through various schools and many moves, and with different groups. And God has been faithful to meet us in every single group, every single time.

I’ve seen God heal, encourage, redirect, provide spouses, draw sinners back home, answer specific prayers, and do the miraculous over the years. Nothing is impossible with God, and there is power when we pray together!

Nothing is impossible with God, and there is power when we pray together!

I’ve witnessed this same power over the last 20 years in the faith-based recovery non-profit in which my husband and I serve. Founded in 1958, Adult & Teen Challenge has centers throughout the United States and around the world, which help men, women, and teens overcome addiction and dysfunction. As a psychologist serving at Adult & Teen Challenge of Texas, I sit with people in their pain. I hear their fears. I help them wrestle with their lies, doubts, and insecurities.

For those who have grown up in families with addiction, there is a devastating thread of trauma, instability, and chaos. Home is a place where fighting abounds—cursing, throwing, hitting, punching. Anyone can touch you, take you, and hurt you. Children are often left to fend for themselves. Teens experiment with the very substances that stole their moms and dads, but once they start, they can’t stop either. To a child caught in the middle – forgotten, unnoticed, neglected – it feels hopeless.

To a child caught in the middle – forgotten, unnoticed, neglected – it feels hopeless.

Shockingly, one out of four children in the U.S. lives in a home with a parent in substance abuse. According to the 2023 U.S. National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), 48.5 million (16.7%) Americans, aged 12 and older, battled a substance use disorder in the past year and over 18 million children are personally impacted by addiction in their homes.

Years ago, Adult & Teen Challenge of Texas opened a Women with Children’s campus to provide recovering women and their young children a safe and stable environment. These courageous women, while in the structured year-long program, often accept Christ—the most important decision to help them turn from their addiction and begin to care for their children.

In 2026, we are thrilled to start an official Moms in Prayer group to teach these moms to pray Scriptures through adoration, confession, thanksgiving and intercession. While we praise God for the moms who are learning to cover their own children in prayer, we recognize the millions of other children in the U.S. who do not have a praying mom and who face great sorrow and suffering while a parent is in addiction.

For this reason, I invite you, praying mom, to stand in the gap. Will you also pray for children who are affected by addiction?

Join us in praying 5 prayer points over these children

Protection: The LORD will keep you from all harm— he will watch over your life; the LORD will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore. Psalm 121:7-8

Provision: And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:19

Peace with God through a relationship with Him: Help these children know they are loved, wanted, and seen. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” Matthew 19:14

Parents come to the Lord and surrender their substances: … open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in Jesus. Acts 26:18

Praying moms: That God would stir the moms’ hearts of these children to become praying moms as well.

I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. 1 Samuel 1:27

Together, let’s bring precious children, impacted by addiction, to the feet of Jesus. Will you join me in responding to their collective cry, “Mom, will you pray for me, too?”

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Dr. Dolly Thomas is a wife, mom, clinical psychologist, and author. She has had the joy of praying with Moms in Prayer since 2011. In 2013, she founded Transform Counseling to bring God’s love and truth to hurting people and families. Since 2009, Dolly has enjoyed serving the staff and students of Adult and Teen Challenge of Texas where she oversees H.O.P.E. Kids, Helping Children Overcome Pain by Encountering Christ. She recently released her first book–a mental health look at the gospel of John– entitled The Storm Whisperer: Letting Jesus Calm your Troubled Mind and Lead you to Mental Wellness.