From the time I was a little girl I was taught the
importance of prayer. Having come to
Christ as a child I knew what the faith of a child was. It must have come to light in about 6th
grade when I attended a Christian School and every morning requests were given
for needs in each home. Mine was always
for my dad to come to know Christ as his Savior. That prayer consistently went up to heaven
over the years. About seven years ago it
became even more urgent as my dad fought stage four cancer. My children asked why I prayed for his
salvation more than I prayed for his healing.
I really believed the eternal spiritual was more important than the
immediate physical. The week my dad was dying
I feared my faith would be shattered, yet I felt that God took my face in His
hands and said, “Look at Me!” And so I
spent my dad’s last week on earth, three continents and an ocean away from him
focusing on God and His attributes and also praying for His salvation. My dad fell asleep 14 hours before he took his last breath on September 8th, 2006.
He never made a verbal profession of faith yet when I get discouraged
God reminds me still to look at Him. I
often think of the hopelessness the disciples felt when Jesus died on the Cross
and they laid His lifeless body in the tomb.
Dead is dead. Yet God proved that
He can totally blow us away even when we know scientific facts. I cling to that! Even though I know spiritual facts from
studying the Bible, I know that God does amazing things. He is not contained in
a box. I can give you other thoughts of
hope that He has given but the fact remains that my hope is in the Lord and Him
alone.
I have to say even though I learned the lesson above I have
been discouraged. I listen to lies such
as, “If you pray for this situation you are sure not to get the answer you
desire, look at what happened with your dad.”
This pounds at me over and over and my book of intercessory prayers gets
laid aside and I stop praying for others.
This week God has been encouraging me again in this area. I am studying the book of James and James’
closing comments command us to pray when we are suffering, praise when we are
cheerful and call the elders to pray over us when we are sick. James 5 The writer of the study I am doing encouraged
us to have faith when we pray and not to give up. Then today I opened up to Luke 18:1-8 and the
first words were, “Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times
they ought to pray and not to lose heart.”
2000 years later I am looking at these words and I feel as though they
are written just for me.
So I will continue to pray for my children and their
spiritual walk and physical and emotional needs. I will continue to pray for unsaved
relatives. I will continue to pray for a
spiritual awakening for Congo and for the U.S.A. I will continue to pray for healing for
friends who are sick. Jesus wants us to
be close to Him, to walk with Him, and to depend on Him. I may not see the results of my prayers but He
doesn’t want me to lose heart. He wants
me to pray.
My mom's comment after reading this blog:
"We each dealt differently but
God had a special plan for each of us in how we listened to Him and trust in
Him. I hope telling it from my side of the world was helpful to you in
some way."
"For now we
see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall
know fully, even as I have been fully known." 1 Cor. 13:12
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