April 11, 2008

Immediate Results

It is not often that the results of prayer are immediate. At least, that has been my experience. In many instances, God is glorified when He demonstrates His sovereign power over a period of time. However, in some cases He moves so mind-bogglingly fast that it leaves us with just enough breath to gasp "thank you, Lord."

Such was the case a week ago Wednesday.

If you have been following this blog for the last couple months, you know that we have been trying to re-vitalize the youth-group prayer time at our church (click here to learn how all this started). On the particular Wednesday in question, I asked the youth group to pray for specific people they knew who were without Christ. It was electric to hear them bring name after name before the throne.

In the course of evening, I mentioned to the Lord the name of a man who was visiting that very evening. I had just met him briefly before we began to pray.

Let me back up to give a little context. For the last several weeks I have been dealing with a severe toothache. So severe that when it throbs into action I can do nothing other than lie down and wait for medicine to take effect. Just as we finished praying, that Wednesday, the tooth started throbbing again. After everybody dispersed, I did not stay for the message but went outside to the car, took my medicine, and waited.

Ironically, this Wednesday my tooth was throbbing just before prayer meeting. Itacyara, Mikey and Nathan went in for the opening while I popped a pill and lay back hoping it would start working before the prayer time. I put in a CD and prayed that everything I had read about the healing powers of classical music was true. To my great relief, within twenty minutes my toothache had retreated to tolerable levels. Whether it was the medicine or Tchaikovsky's Concerto in B flat minor--or both--I will never know. The important thing is that I made it into church just as prayer time was starting.

As the young people gathered in the room we spent a few minutes quieting our hearts before God, as is our custom. The I asked if anybody had any reports of the conversion of anybody we had prayed for.

There was a silence, and then someone said "Oh, you weren't here for the announcements last week, were you." They then informed me that while we were praying for the visitor, one of our deacons was leading him to Christ!

How awesome is THAT!

If only my tooth medication worked that fast.

Posted by Andrew on April 11, 2008 4:45 PM.

Comments

Posted by: Pregador27 at April 11, 2008 5:32 PM