Please check out the post below from Valarie, the Prayer Coordinator. I had just told you God was going to bless her for obeying His call and look at what He has done. Take the time to read it all. It is incredible. Praise Him. I love you, Lord!!
Alot of unsaved people ask, "Why do you bother?", "Does God REALLY care about you?", "Do you REALLY think He's listening to your prayers and acting on them?". Those questions make a lot of sense to me if I see them from the view of someone who doesn't believe. I can understand how difficult "believing" is. It's difficult for me at times, as a believer. Times when I see children sick or dying, times when healthy, vibrant young people die too soon, times when we get a diagnosis that rocks us, times when we don't know where our next meal is coming from. Those times make it hard for me to understand. Yet, without believing in my God who spoke and created the universe, moved His hand and spun the stars into space, I can't even begin to imagine the hopelessness of all these situations.I say all of that to share with you some of the "why" I believe. I'll give you a few examples from my life, lately. My husband got laid off from his job last July and went until Sept. before finding another job. We had to move because we couldn't pay rent. God put a couple in our lives who were going thru difficulties of their own financially and had a house they needed someone to rent. He was in construction and not working much here so they went to New Orleans to help her sister rebuild from Katrina damage and he has more work now than he can get done! So, God provided us with a home. My husband's new company closed it's doors Dec. 1. Yes, he was out of a job - AGAIN! They laid off 735 people across the US. So on Jan. 8th God put a new job in our path. My dear friend is in a prayer group with the man who owns a company in the field my husband is in. He called Jimmy, and basically hired him on the spot. The owner. Not the HR people, but the OWNER! HUGE God thing! That just doesn't happen in my husband's line of work. I give you that background to tell you about this past week. As you saw from yesterday's post I am still "flying high" from my weekend on the mountaintop and then our AWESOME day of worship at my church Sunday. Monday comes along and it starts! We have been surviving on unemployment benefits all this time. I mean, barely, surviving but the Lord Jehovah Jireh has met our needs. NOT OUR WANTS! No, my kids didn't get XBox 360 for Christmas but they did get Gameboy Advance and that THRILLED them beyond belief! Anyway, we paid our bills last week and only had $6 left thru the weekend but we were ok and were expecting our unemployment money. This was going to be the last week of benefits as Jimmy would start getting paid for his new job this week. Little did we know that the benefits are given on a weekly basis and since Jimmy gets paid this week - Thursday - they stopped the money! So, we had $6, a tiny bit of food in the pantry, no milk, a 1/2 loaf of bread, no dog food, 1/2 tank of gas in our van and less than 1/4 of a tank in Jimmy's truck. SPECIAL! Well, instead of panicking and calling my family begging for money, I got on my knees. I turned to Matthew 6:25-34 where it says things like "So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?'" and "do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself." I'm sure you're thinking, yeah right, don't worry when there's no money coming and no food to feed 3 bottomless pits! Well all I can tell you is that I got up off my knees, emailed 6 of the mightiest prayer warriors I knew and told them to get busy praying. I specifically told them that I was NOT asking for a handout from them because I wanted to see God move in a way that EVERYONE would know it was from Him! They each encouraged me not to give in to the idols of worry and money but to "seek first His kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." So I put on some praise music and started cleaning my house and just spent the rest of the morning praising Him. Then about 2:00 an obedient Abraham friend of mine called and said she heard what was going on and she had purchased several grocery gift cards to give her Sunday school class as gifts for Christmas. She said that she had cleaned her office last week and found $200 in cards and she was bringing them to me!!! She was on her way to the store so I told her I would come to meet her. As I was loading up all 3 kids, the power went out. I immediately (panic instead of prayer - I admit) call Jimmy to see if the bill had been paid. He said it had - in fact that was why we didn't have any money - we had paid all the bills expecting money on Monday. Lo and behold there was a bad wreck and power was out from 2:30 til 7:30 last night. So, I didn't go to the store as I needed to do homework while there was plenty of light - just in case. (ended up being a good thing) While I was working with the kids God sent another Moses to my door. A girlfriend who said she opened her refrigerator and there were 2 gallons of milk in it. She said "I NEVER buy 2 gallons of milk and there's no way we'll drink it all" so she was obedient in sharing from her abundance! UNREAL! Then about 2 hours later another Isaac and Jacob showed up at my door with a gift card from the grocery store ANOTHER gallon of milk and a pizza because they had heard about the power outage. THEN, the girlfriend I was supposed to meet at the store - you remember the one I called Abraham - called. She was going to the store earlier to make a meal for a couple in her class who had just had a baby. She called to tell me they lived RIGHT HERE IN MY DEVELOPMENT so she would bring the gift cards to me! When her and her husband came thru my door they had a few snacks for my kids, they had the gift cards to the store, they had money to put gas in our cars and some for "emergency" PLUS they gave us restaurant gift cards so we could go out to eat after church Sunday!!! You see, that's the way God works!! I had faith in Him to provide for me! Now, He put that faith into action thru some people who were willing to listen to His voice and so what He told them too. I did not ask a SINGLE person for anything yesterday. In fact, I told my prayer warriors I didn't want them to give me anything but God moved in a couple of them to either bring to me what abundance they had or to share our situation with the ones He ordained to meet our need! I didn't panic and seek out my family or friends first! I went to my knees to seek my Abba Father in heaven and He meet my need! THAT'S what believing is! Now, do I have this mastered and am I "super spiritual"! OF COURSE NOT!! I mean, take a look at my reaction when the power went out. Did I pray and ask God to handle it? NO! I called Jimmy freaking out! (had to repent for that one) Anyway, I hope sharing my example of why I believe in a big G God will either make you long to know Him as your own or encourage you to draw close under the shadow of His holy wings. To go into the Holy Place and dwell there with Him! Come out of the courtyard of the tabernacle! Believe me, it smells MUCH sweeter in here!!
