It was my wedding day. I stood at the window of my apartment staring at the downpour. The open-air ceremony started in a couple hours, and this rain was no San Diego sprinkle, it was a Mid-Texas Tsunami from the sky. Even with an umbrella, the rain hits the pavement so hard you get soaked from the splash. I took a deep, deep breath. “Lord, help…”
It’s strange how I pray more when things aren’t going right for me. Why don’t I pray more for others – or for God to step in and stop so much of the evil in the world?
I had this thought of me standing before God. He looked a little chagrined. “You know, I made you the most powerful person on the planet.”
“What?” I stammered. “That can’t be right. I’m smart enough. I’m not articulate enough. Come to think of it, I’m not anything enough to fight against all the wrongs out there.”
He looked me in the eye. “No, you’re not, but I AM. All you had to do was pray.”
Maybe he made you the most powerful person on the planet. Are you praying as if he did?
God plans to do incredible things in this world, and for some reason he wants to do them with us – father/son or father/daughter projects. That’s why he had an old man use a stick to part the red sea, and twelve knuckleheads with a kid’s lunch to feed more than five thousand people.
Jesus said that you and I have at our fingertips, power that can do literally anything. He simply said to ask (pray) in his will. Here’s what I’ve learned about prayer.
Ask God to make your heart (your will) like his. Dallas Willard says that God wants to make us into people he can trust with his power.(a)
When you pray, if nothing visible happens, and you think nothing happened, that’s the devil’s idea. The devil doesn’t have to get you to be evil, he just has to get you to stop asking.(b)
Jesus taught us to pray without ever giving up. Want to know how to pray with faith? Keep asking and asking and asking.(c)
Jesus said to ask audaciously. The Greek word he used, ἀναίδεια, means shameless, impudent, and with a lack of modesty.(d)
The rain stopped and the clouds parted just before we arrived at Chapel Dulcinea. Everything glistened. The afternoon sun bounced rainbows off the buildings and walkways, and when I kissed the bride, the sky was bathed in purple fire (see the picture). It was more than a yes, it felt like a wedding present from the Most High.
What if we prayed audacious prayers all the time and about everything? What if when you stand before God, he says with a grin, “We did a good job down there, didn’t we?”(e)
(a) Ezekiel 36:26 And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart.
(b) Daniel 10:12-13 [the angel] said … from the first day … your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words. 13 But the prince of the kingdom of Persia opposed me twenty-one days… What if Daniel gave up on day 20?
(c) Luke 18:1-8 [the judge says] yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’
(d) Luke 11:5-8 yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need.
(e) Never stop praying. 1 Thessalonians 5:17
– Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything… Philippians 4:6
– With five thousand plus people to feed, the disciples asked Jesus what to do, he said, “You feed them.” (Mark 6:37-44) Was there a mischievous glint in his eye? I think so.