I was talking with one the ladies on PI’s training team about my support raising. She’s done it, so she is a good one to ask for advice and such. I told her that I’m supposed to go from 29% to 75% in 4 weeks. Now, I’m normally a worrier. Anything and everything, it doesn’t matter. I like to have a plan and if there’s no plan, I make one. And then even when I have a plan, I worry about the plan not working so I make a plan b, then a plan c…you get my drift. That’s a topic for another day…
We talked about prayer and how important it is. And she said something that really made me think. She said, “the thing about praying for patience is that God normally makes you wait.” Kinda makes you not want to pray for it, huh? That reminds me of being in high school. Our youth group went on yearly worktrips and one of the themes was always Isaiah 6:8 where God asks, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” and Isaiah answers, “Here am I! Send me.”
That always scared me. I knew that if I prayed that, if I actually meant it, that God was going to send me alone into some jungle to live for the rest of my life. I wanted to mean it, but didn’t know if I could. I would pray telling God that I would pray it, as long as he wouldn’t send me to live forever in a hut in the jungle. I wasn’t cut out for it. I think it was the kind of prayer that God hears and says, “do you hear yourself?”
Do we hear ourselves?
“Lord, please give me patience…now”
“Lord, send me…but not there”
“Lord, I trust you…but I’m going to do it my way first”
“Lord, help me get into your word more…after I finish watching LOST or Heroes, or whatever show I’m into”
The funny thing is, God did send me anyway. And now, I get to help send others. Others who probably have prayed “here am I send me.” Maybe they meant it when they said it, maybe they didn’t. All I know is that God is using them. God is using me and God is using you.
