Mommy, Daddy, Sammy

I was sure God was going to answer our prayer.

• Our leadership team, all abiders in Christ and claiming John 15:6, begged God to rescue our budget with a huge December.
• Following our Lord’s instructions on prayer (Matthew 6:5-13; 7:7-11; Luke 11:1-13; 18:1-5), we prayed specifically and persistently.
• We prayed alone, as couples, as families, in groups, and in community at all of our Christmas leadership events.
• Most of us fasted and prayed multiple times during December.

I was so sure that God would say yes to this prayer because usually He says yes when a request burdens our community in this way.

God Said No

He said no. Emphatically no. It wasn’t that He was testing us some to see if we would trust Him enough to move forward with a more robust budget in 2012 by giving us a partial yes. Our December giving didn’t even come close.

I’m devastated and my faith is shaken.

Like you, I don’t know what to do with no answers to my purest prayers when it seems I did everything right. I started doubting whether I really was abiding, if I was asking unselfishly enough, if maybe I was foolish to be so bold and public in leading our church in this prayer.

I came up with strategies to explain away the no. Some of that I’m sure was to protect the “reputation” of God, but a lot of it was simply to try to make sense of it myself.

And then, my grandson Zachy taught me a lesson on prayer.

Jesus rejoiced in the childlike faith of His disciples. Their excited reports of what God had done for them after their first missionary journey, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name” (Luke 10:17), elicits this response from the Master:

“I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this was your gracious will” (Luke 10:21).

Zachy

Zachy was spending the night with us for the first time in his almost three years on earth Friday night. He had moved from a world of a lot of no’s (too many if his parents were to consult Judy and me!) to a world of yes’s. He got just about everything he wanted that night. Okay, I admit it. He got everything he wanted that night.

But then, when it came time to go to bed, his little heart broke. He cried and cried, saying only, “Mommy, Daddy, Sammy” over and over again. Finally, after an hour of comforting him and stroking his little back, he fell asleep with the whispered whimper, “Mommy, Daddy, Sammy.”

The next morning when mommy and daddy and brother Sammy came to pick him up, he ran into their arms and immediately asked them for something he couldn’t have.

They told him no. He protested. And then he asked again.

Children don’t care as much about yes’s as they do about relationship. They protest and throw fits when daddy says no, but what they most fear is being away from daddy…and mommy…and Sammy.

What a child wants most is the secure love of a parent and the familiar surroundings of the community of the family.

But they never stop asking!

The Measure of Faith

There’s my lesson. We tend to measure faith by adult behavior. God measures faith by childlike behavior.

I’m still begging my Father for more money to do the things we want to do for His Kingdom in 2012, but I’m not going to try to fine tune my prayers.

He’s given me what my redeemed heart longs for most: His unfailing love and strength, and a community of faith where I feel safe.

Just like Zachy, what we really want is the presence of our Father rather than His yes.

Question: When God says no to your prayers, do you tend toward more adult behavior of explanation or the childlike behavior of running to His arms and protesting His no?

Our first worship service was just about to begin when I noticed someone running toward my usual “preacher front-row seat.”

My sweet seven-year old granddaughter, Mary with her long brown curls and bright blue eyes ran into my arms in all of her Sunday morning best, hugged my neck and said, “Good morning, Papa!”

It wasn’t “grown-up” behavior. It was wonderfully childlike.

An adult would never do what she did. Grown-ups don’t think and act that way. Grown-up thoughts would have considered the crowd, wondered what they thought, calculated that this might be an embarrassment to them and a distraction to others and decide not to run to someone they love, hug their neck, and tell them good morning. No matter how much a grown-up might love that person, they would never express it with such innocent exuberance.

But a child would, because it doesn’t matter whose looking as much as whom they are trusting. Mary ran into my arms because she knew that she was running to a safe place, to the arms of someone who loves her.

Childlike Faith

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Innocent Trust

Our first worship service was just about to begin when I noticed someone running toward my usual “preacher front-row seat.”

My sweet seven-year old granddaughter, Mary with her long brown curls and bright blue eyes ran into my arms in all of her Sunday morning best, hugged my neck and said, “Good morning, Papa!”

It wasn’t “grown-up” behavior. It was wonderfully childlike.

An adult would never do what she did. Grown-ups don’t think and act that way. Grown-up thoughts would have considered the crowd, wondered what they thought, calculated that this might be an embarrassment to them and a distraction to others and decide not to run to someone they love, hug their neck, and tell them good morning. No matter how much a grown-up might love that person, they would never express it with such innocent exuberance.

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So Many Obstacles!

Have you ever moved forward in faith, sure that you knew what God wanted you to do, only to encounter trial after trial, roadblock after roadblock?

In January of 2005 we celebrated our 90th Anniversary by raising over $600,000 to begin transforming our campus. We knew God wanted us to build on this beautiful piece of property. A new worship center seemed like the logical choice. So we initiated a capital campaign, and started planning our construction.

Every month we poured ourselves into the project. We estimated the scope and cost, and announced it to the congregation. And then, something would happen and we would have to rethink and re-plan, and re-report the revised plans and figures to our people.

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