Olympics and Following the will of God

Tonight, the good o’ Irishman at my church preached on what it means to follow the will of God.  It was a very honest sermon, where he went as far as telling us that, in fact, he did not want to be at our church.  But because he knows clearly that it was by the will of God that he came here, he absolutely loves every moment of it.

A few moments afterwards, our senior pastor got up to do the announcements and mentioned that a good number of churches in Richmond, including the white churches, are going on a prayer walk at the Richmond Olympics Oval this Saturday to intercede for our city and for the upcoming sporting event.

At first I was quite “meh” about it.  I mean, I don’t give a toss about the Olympics, in fact I want to piss all over it, and going to a prayer walk on an early Saturday morning is about the last thing I want to do these days.

But my friend, who is filled with the Spirit, brought to me the conviction that I have been consciously avoiding for far too long.

“I just want to go see if there are any pretty girls there”, he said.

You know the feeling you get when you know clearly that God is calling you to do something worthy?  Something that glorifies His name?  Something that brings a wee little tear to your eye?

I don’t give a toss about the Olympics, I don’t feel like going to a prayer walk, but I do care so very much about following the will of God, and seizing every opportunity to meet some nice, devout Christian girls is a big part of that.

Oh, I am SO going to this prayer meeting!

Psalm 13

As I started praying for Elise (refer to a couple of posts back if you want to know what happened) a couple of days ago, I was reminded of the song Psalm 13 (How Long O Lord) by Brian Doerksen:

How long O Lord will You forget me
How long O Lord will You look the other way
How long O Lord must I wrestle with my thoughts
And every day have such sorrow in my heart

Look on me and answer, O God my Father
Bring light to my darkness before they see me fall

But I trust in Your unfailing love
Yes my heart will rejoice
Still I sing of Your unfailing love
You have been good, You will be good to me

When I got to the last bit of the song (v. 5-6), I wept.

It’s beautiful, isn’t it.

This is the meaning of prayer.  Not that God answers our requests in a certain way, but that we come to the foot of the cross and see that amidst all our sufferings and despair and hopelessness, God is a faithful and loving God who has already long since conquered it all for us.

Yes, my heart will rejoice.

The battle is already won.

This has officially replaced “You Will Carry Me” by Mark Schultz as my go-to song for times of hardship, because I quite honestly think that Mark needs to pick a lower key for his song.

completely speechless

I am left completely speechless.

There is this couple at my church. Great Christians. The husband is a great leader. The wife is a sweet lady.

She was pregnant with their baby. But some complications arose, and they had a miscarriage.

And to take a break from all that, they went on a cruise.

And the wife got into an accident. She has a head injury. Internal bleeding. In a coma. And now in critical condition.

I don’t know what else to say other than “How can this be happening?”

“You give and take away……”

Pray for her. Her name is Elise.