Series: Flowers in the Desert
Deuteronomy 31:8 ESV
Philippians 1:6 ESV
Colossians 1:9-12 ESV
2 Chronicles 7:14 ESV
Sometimes it takes time and a few hundred lessons before I stop and realize what I’ve been doing isn’t working.
Then, once I realize something needs to change, I have to figure out how to change it.
I know how to build a strategy so I used to build a strategy. Then I would set out to execute the strategy.
Looking back, I laugh.
Even though it’s not funny, I laugh. I laugh because I would eventually realize that no matter what I was doing I was spinning my wheels.
No matter how hard I planned and tried to execute the plan I just wasn’t getting anywhere.
The truth is that from the late 1950’s until 1987 I relied on my dad. Whenever I had a problem I would tell my dad and I knew he would pray.
He used to talk about “praying something all the way through.”
I wasn’t sure exactly what that meant but I knew he would pray the request for me all the way through.
I knew without any doubt that he relied on God.
Deuteronomy 31:8 says, “It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.”
I knew because my dad was praying everything would be okay.
Then one day mid-year in 1987 everything changed. My dad was diagnosed with cancer. It started in the bladder and it moved quickly. Within two months he was gone.
I was lost.
I had relied on my dad’s prayers for 30+ years and now he was gone.
The next days, months, and even years were a blur. I started praying…really praying but things didn’t change instantly like I’d hoped. But because of my dad and his prayer life, I didn’t give up. I was determined to learn how to pray so I read every book I could get my hands on about prayer.
I learned that the most important thing was spending time with God…somebody called him papa God.
I loved that! I loved it because I missed my dad and I needed a dad…a papa. It took time but eventually I trusted papa God the way I trusted my dad when I was little.
That’s when I grew up.
I was an adult, but until then I wasn’t really relying on God. I was relying on my dad’s faith and his prayers.
The movie War Room is one of my favorite movies of all times. When it came out I watched it and as soon as I could, I bought it. I continued to watch it over and over again (I AM a binge watcher!)
One, just one of my favorite lines from the movie says, “It’s my job to seek Him, to trust Him, and to stand on His word.” War Room, Movie
As hard as it was to lose my dad, when that happened my life changed.
I grew up in God.
Philippians 1:6 tells us, “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”
God is still working on me, but I know I can always count on God.
The Apostle Paul wrote in Colossians 1:9-12, “And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy; giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.”
Today, I pray for you.
I pray for a new generation of warriors. I see my grandchildren. I see a generation of warriors and I pray that their generation will pray and fight for our world.
So…what about you?
2 Chronicles 7:14 says, “if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
And so be it.
Spiritual Practice: Pray
Join with me and pray for the generations that are coming. Pray they will turn to God and pray…
In God, Deborah