There is a young person I am aware of who, in the past several years, has gone through some seasons of difficulty. My family and I have prayed for this young person and I've even prayed+fasted at least once, maybe twice. Except for a rare quick prayer we have not prayed for them in an intense way for some time now.
Recently I spoke with this young person and learned that they have quietly, deeply, and sincerely re-dedicated their life to the Lord! I also learned the Lord has spoken to them in some fairly profound ways. I was stunned by the warmth,wisdom, compassion, and spirituality of this young person and TOTALLY encouraged!
While I spoke to them the Lord opened my eyes to the fact that my prayers were still working in this young person's life even years later- even though I had not prayed for them lately. The Lord clearly showed me as I spoke to them that he continued to answer the prayers and requests I had made- long after I had prayed them.
I was very proud of this young person, encouraged by their progress, and stunned by the ongoing answers to my prayers and intercession. I thought about this situation and let it simmer on the back-burner in my mind...until the next day...
When I went to work the next day (this all happened very recently) I received an update from a Christian friend of mine about their brother-in-law (whom I will call "DM") whom we had both prayed for- probably for a year now. DM had severe health issues, family challenges, financial challenges, and lost his job. He was also suffering from severe depression. My work friend and I had tag-team prayed for DM through many challenging circumstances and the update I received on this day was that DM was doing better physically, his family life is more stable, and he is in a stronger place emotionally. Other than some quick occasional prayers in the past couple of weeks I had not intensely prayed for DM for a couple of weeks- since the last difficult crisis he had gone through. As I was standing there hearing the update on DM's solid progress the Lord opened my eyes yet again to show me that prayers offered on DM's behalf some time ago continued to roll on in his life.
In my entire life I have never heard, thought, or known that prayers continue to roll on and have an effective work long after you pray them- and here I was hearing a second story in two days about the ongoing effects of prayer. Stunning. STUNNING. It was amazing that the Lord had first of all given me in two days, two stories of people who benefitted from my prayers in a much more lasting way than I could have imagined. It was also amazing that the Lord opened my eyes to the lesson to tie the two stories together.
WHAT an encouraging lesson- I am so thankful. How powerful and full of faith I will be able to come near to the throne of God to pray for a situation, a nation, or a person! This is a super new thing for me so I don't have many additional thoughts about it- just a couple of quick conclusions:
1.) When we pray- it has a LASTING impact long after we pray.
2.) Another reason the prayers have a lasting impact like this is because we aren't praying to a slot machine but to a PERSONAL God who cares about the situation more than we do, understands it better than we do, and is more faithful than we can imagine!
I love you God - help us all to run with the lesson that you are faithful to answer prayers even years after we've prayed them!
Let's GO God!
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