God's Answering Machine

...in Jesus name, Amen.

So, you've just prayed for something. Maybe a simple request, like healing for a cold or "traveling mercies" over Thanksgiving vacation or for help finding your phone. Maybe it's a huge request, like healing for cancer or for refugees fleeing from Syria and Paris or for wisdom for your life plan.

But you end your prayer and wait. "They" say that prayer is a conversation, and you've just done your part of the talking. "Your turn," you tell God. And you wait. And you wait.

By the time life's busyness sweeps you away from waiting, you've decided that you must have caught God's answering machine. So you leave a message. "Hey, just get back to me whenever you get a chance. You know how to get in touch with me. You're God, after all."

Having done all you can, you move on. I mean, you don't really move on, because your request is still pending and you still need an answer. But once you've tried prayer, it's time to go on to Plan B.

If Plans B, C, D, and E fail, then maybe you try again. "Maybe God's done taking care of the orphans in Africa and keeping the planets spinning so I can ask Him again," you might think. "He'll be ready and able to answer me."

But to your dismay, you catch voicemail again. Maybe you don't even make it to "Amen" before you realize you're talking to yourself. So you resolve to try Plan F.

Over time, maybe you forgot that you prayed for healing for the cold you finally got over. Maybe you find your phone in your pocket and get on to work. Maybe a door opened for you to move forward in your career. And life goes on.

"God, why haven't you answered my prayer?" you ask the next time you pray. "I know that your answer isn't always 'yes', but I need at least some response!"

I totally did not expect to find a cartoon depicting the premise of this entire post!

One day, you sit down and reflect on what's happened in the past few weeks, months, or even years. And you realize...

...You asked for healing from a cold. A few days later, you recovered and got on with your life, and you forgot to thank God for healing you.

...You asked for help finding your phone. A few minutes later, you found it in an obvious place and rushed to work and forgot to thank God for revealing it to you.

...You asked for wisdom, and looking back, you can see that God guided you away from a path that was bad for you and gave you the very best.

And you realize that your prayers were never voicemail left on God's answering machine. You finally discover that He's been watching and protecting and guiding you all along. Every yes and every no has led you to this moment.

And you understand that, no matter how distant or busy He seems, no matter how terrible your circumstances appear, no matter how daunting your request, God is answering.

You just have to slow down long enough to see that it is God's hand working for your good in your life.

Take some time to reflect on your own answered prayers and thank God for His great faithfulness.

Team Playing

So unity in Christ has been on my mind a lot lately, for a variety of reasons. I've talked about love for fellow Christians in a previous post, how important it is that the world can "know us by our love." But in my devotional recently, I was struck by a different angle. I was reading Ephesians 4 in The Message version (don't judge! It's good to switch things up a little because some verses stick out more with different wording) and I stopped short to think about it.


Throughout the chapter, Paul had been encouraging the Ephesians to mature in their faith, to have endurance, and then we get to verses 4-6.

You were all called to travel on the same road and in the same direction, so stay together, both outwardly and inwardly. You have one Master, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who rules over all, works through all, and is present in all. Everything you are and think and do is permeated with Oneness.

This really made me think, because we usually think of Christianity as a road, and we occasionally acknowledge that other Christians are also on the road. But what struck me was that we are all on the SAME road, in the SAME direction, so we should stick together. Life is often portrayed as a race, but it's not supposed to be. A race means competition, and competition means trying to be better than someone else, and that sometimes means putting others down to put yourself ahead.

I kept reading as Paul elaborates on that, saying that we all have different callings within our same direction, that we must grow up in our faith, and that we must put away all the old worldly ways.

Verse 25 made me stop.

What this adds up to, then, is this: no more lies, no more pretense. Tell your neighbor the truth. In Christ’s body we’re all connected to each other, after all. When you lie to others, you end up lying to yourself.

"We're all connected to each other." This reminds me of 1 Corinthians 12, where Paul talks about the church being one body, how one part is no better than any other. Maybe it was just coming from the context I was in, but it hit me in a new way.

Most of you are familiar with team sports such as football, basketball, even Ultimate Frisbee. Whether or not you have ever played on a team, I'm confident that you know that it is a bad thing if one of your team members gets hurt, so you would never intentionally injure one of your teammates.

But imagine a team, with the same goal and same purpose and same strong enemy, that is constantly divided! One of the stronger, "star" players knocks over a weak teammate and breaks the ankle of another strong teammate so he can get the glory. Or a well-respected athlete spreads rumors about another teammate so that no one plays to her. Wouldn't you think that team was insane? After all, who would hurt one of their own when a strong and unified enemy stood ready to destroy the whole team?

Yet we as Christians tear each other down every day!

Why do we do this? Ultimately, of course, it comes down to the fact that we are all sinners. But I think a big part of the problem is that we feel like we have something to prove. I don't know who we're trying to prove it to (ourselves? others? God?) but we act like we have it all together, with just enough visible flaws for us to appear spiritual.

But our actions show that we are, in fact, no better than the world. We gossip. We spread rumors. We form our little cliques and shut everyone else out. We tear people down. We ignore each other. We get mad at each other and worst of all we let our anger get in the way of our worship.

If our disunity (read: insanity) as Christians can break my heart, imagine how it breaks God's heart! Brothers and sisters, we can't go on like this! There is too much at stake for us to fracture our relationships over petty disagreements and frustrations. The enemy stands ready to take any foothold.

It's time to start treating each other as God intended: with love and respect as teammates in the cosmic battle for our souls.