Are you listening, God?

A few weeks ago when I was at work, one of the nurses aides told me one of our residents wanted to see me. I went to her room and found her crying. When I asked what was wrong, she said she was upset because she wanted to go home. She said "I just want to go to my own home and no one will let me! I've asked everyone and I'm still here. I've cried out to the Lord and asked Him to let me go home and I'm still here. Why won't He answer me?"
My response to her was that He knows best and although this wasn't what she would like there is a reason for it.
In actuality, she won't be able to go home. She has dementia and is unable to live on her own. When she was in her home, she was leaving pans on the stove, with the burner on. She fell several times and isn't able to make proper decisions for herself.
To her, it feels like God doesn't care and isn't listening. In looking at the bigger picture, I can see that going home wouldn't be the right thing for her.
This made me think - how often do I pray for things, wondering why God doesn't appear to be answering? It's a good reminder that God knows all and when He doesn't answer the way we want, we have to remember that His way really is what is best for us.

Prayer

Tonight we went to a dinner and short prayer seminar for local prayer leaders and prayer team members. One of the speakers discussed this verse: "The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective." James 5:17

He then spoke about being righteous. Usually when we hear that word, we think of someone who is a "super Christian", or someone we can never be like. He told us what righteous actually means - in right relationship. Not perfect, not religious, but in a relationship with God. And really, that's what prayer is about. It's not saying the right words, it's not being brave enough to pray out loud, it's just talking to God. I don't know about you, but I am certainly not anywhere near perfect nor am I any great model Christian. Isn't it amazing that God wants to have a realtionship with us everyday people and loves to hear from us? Isn't it even more amazing that God says when we talk to him, it is "powerful and effective?"

The speaker left us with this quote:

"When man works, man works. When man prays, God works."

Urgent Prayer Request

A blogging friend has a son that needs prayer. He ate something bad yesterday and had to be taken by helicopter to the hospital. She asked that we post this and pray for him. His name is Nathan and her name is Lorie. You can check out her blog here.

Day of Fasting and Prayer

This weekend I had the privilege of attending a time of prayer and fasting that was held by the Women's Ministries at our church. When I saw it was being held on my weekend off, I knew that I was meant to go. I knew that if I went I would be blessed, however I was worried about going without sleep and food for that length of time (6pm Friday to 3pm Saturday). I was also being selfish in not wanting to give up a good part of my weekend off. As I was praying about it before I went, I heard in my head "can't you even give up one weekend, willingly for me?" It brought me back to reading about Peter and John in the garden, being asked if they could stay awake and pray.

As I knew I would be, I was blessed by being there. We enjoyed a great time of fellowship and prayer. We were still feeling alert when we finished on Saturday, despite the small amount of sleep we got, and none of us felt very hungry or had problems with headaches or nausea. This was obviously an answer to prayer.

It was impressed on me that I have a problem with pride. We had a form to fill out with characteristics of proud people and humble people and there were things on the pride side that surprised me and really confronted me with this issue. Pride can be seen in things like being concerned about what others will think of them, wanting to cover up mistakes and dealing with generalities instead of specifics when it comes to sins, just to name a few. We decided that pride is something that is at the root of many sins, and is the cause of many issues in our marriages. God calls us in Colossions 3:12-13 to be compassionate, kind, humble, gentle patient, forgiving, loving, in unity with each other, peaceful and thankful. He also says in 1 Peter 3:4 that we should have a gentle and a quiet spirit. It is very difficult to truly be any of those things when we are harbouring pride. It's something that can sneak up on us so frequent prayer and confession is needed.
We spent time studying, praying; both individually and together and sharing. We also did a little sleeping and goofing off. We left, tired and a little hungry, but refreshed and happy.