Praying Through

This year God told me to wait.

Wait for Him to move.

Wait for Him to fight.

Wait for Him to make things happen.

And He has moved, fought, and made things happen.

And still He tells me to wait.

Wait so I can see Him move in amazing ways.

Wait so He can heal me.

Wait so He can refine me.

And while I wait I pray for wisdom, direction, timing, and God’s hand.

His perfect will is going to happen and sometimes He lets hard things happen in the course of His perfect will.

Things that can sour me.

Things that eat away at my heart and hurt terribly.

Things that make we want to walk away from people, maybe even the church.

Still I know these difficult things God allows. He only holds me in the fire long enough to refine me.

And the fire burns. It feels like dying. And I want to run. I want to blame others and maybe others are at fault.

But that doesn’t mean God can’t refine me as I let go of my ways and let Him burn the pride away.

God is showing me that He can bring reconciliation.

He can bring healing.

He can work this out for His glory.

And somehow the beauty of His majesty will be seen.

So I wait and I pray and I cling to God and His broken people – and we all are broken.

My brokenness undoubtedly has scraped and scarred some folks.

And maybe their brokenness pricks and burns me too.

But God has called a broken people to do His work.

And these broken people are Christ’s bride and my mind cannot hold the beauty and horror of that truth.

He calls us holy and still we are to strive to be holy.

He says we are one and still we must work for unity.

He has won the victory and still there are battles to be fought.

And it is here in the already and the not yet that I pray and wait.

I pray for peace.

I pray against violence.

I pray for those abused and abandoned.

I pray for the misused and enslaved.

I pray for those lost and hopeless.

I pray for reconciliation and repentance.

I pray “Your kingdom come.”

And I wait for God to move.

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So who is memorizing 1 John with me? I’ve got chapter 1 and nearly all of the first three verses of chapter 2. So let’s try to get 1 John 2:3-6 this week. We will do a review week next week to make sure we have all of chapter one and the first six verses of chapter two.