Thursday, June 12, 2008

praying in hope

I am writing this with tears of joy in my eyes. My friend's mother has become a Christian! How wonderful that her faithful prayers for her mum have been answered, and we will spend eternity together rejoicing in Jesus!

Often I forget to pray for people to become Christians. Or I pray, because I know I'm supposed to, but not with any great hope or passion. Mentally, I've put them in the "too hard" basket, which is where I would have put this girl's mum.

But God's Spirit is powerful. He convicts our hard hearts of sin, and opens our blind eyes to the beauty of Jesus. How dare I question his love, power and willingness to save?

I have been given renewed hope to pray. To pray for my neighbours, my relatives, my hairdresser. To pray for the mums I chat with at school and kinder. To pray that our conversations would include many opportunities to speak about my hope in Jesus. To pray for patience to listen, courage to speak, and the words to say.

To pray, knowing that we have a great God who answers prayer, who delights to save unlikely people like you and me.

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. ... Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. Colossians 4:2, 5-6

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

praise God :) I read Jonah this morning and was similarly struck. kn