Prayer

As you read our comments about moving and all of the various things God did (and is still doing) to make all of this work, I hope you realize how much prayer is a part of this. Ruth Ann wrote about our tire problems - nothing but prayer got us through that night. As I read a classmates blog:HERE I STAND: Pray Without Ceasing, I thought even more about prayer.

A friend recently emailed me and asked to pray for a friend (not uncommon). I replied that I would gladly do so, and then thought about it. Do people ask us to pray because they think seminarians know a better way to pray? Or is it because they think we need the practice? Or is their prayer life just not up to praying for someone else? David brings up a good point, in talking about Luther and his instructions to his friend the barber. Maybe as people ask us to pray, we should not only agree, but also offer instruction on how to pray for themselves.

Another thought about prayer is the question of "Does it really do any good?" or "Does God answer prayers?" A story to answer these questions. On Monday morning, we were enjoying our first day off as new interns. We were sitting down to breakfast, and I was thinking about all of the service requests we had put in. For almost a week, we had been trying to get our phone installed and working - without any success. We had put several maintenance request in with the apartment management - with no response. The final straw came Sunday night when our upstairs neighbor had problems with his washing machine, and we had water streaming down the hallway walls, out of light fixtures, etc. I called the emergency maintenance number (on my cell phone, since our land-line did not work) and tried to get them to come and clean up - no such luck.

So Monday, I was thinking about having to call the phone company, and the apartment manager, and how I was going to have to threaten them in order to get something done, when I thought - no, wait. Let's just pray about this and see what happens. I prayed for maintenance, and patience, and before I finished my breakfast, the phone man came and fixed our phone. Mid-morning, the pest control man came (not one I had called, but always a good idea). Then, by mid-afternoon, one of the apartment maintenance staff appeared, and fixed all of our known problems. So in response to the question of does prayer work, the answer is yes! Why the extra guy? Just to make a point. When asked about coincidence, one of our professors had remarked that once was coincidence, twice was something more, three times was a definite pattern. So the pest control guy was just to make sure that there was no question about my prayer having been answered.

Pray without ceasing, then give thanks that your prayer has been heard.

Thanks be to God!