Come to the altar.

The weekend of the children's Christmas performance at church is always a monumental one. The seats fill up with expectant parents and extended family members who can hardly hold their excitement as the children who have been practicing their lines for months prepare for the day of delivery. Scenes of a manger beckon to be surrounded by the baby Jesus and the camaraderie that he brings. The children take a bow as the audience delivers a standing ovation and the director and and her helpers take a deep breath of relief that no child fell off the stage or needed to go to the bathroom moments before delivering lines. It is truly a magical service.

After the program, the children occupied two rows reserved for them until their parents picked them up after a short message was delivered. It was during this time that the true magic of the service happened.  I will say that usually when the kids are in the service, it is during worship and because they are seated far from where I stand on the stage, I usually don't see if this is a regular occurance or not. But today, God gave me a  gift that came in the form of children in complete surrender to the beckon of the altar. The first time it happened, the pastor led his message with a prayer and the children stood up from their seats and lined the altar with their bodies, and the heavens with their praises. It happened a second time when the pastor prayed the service out, albeit a smaller group the second time around. I praised God for allowing these kids to push past the common altar call and simply dash forward as if to say, "I am here Lord. Your servant is listening." Sound familiar? (Story of Samuel in the Bible)

"Prayer is not asking. Prayer is putting oneself in the hands of God, at his disposition, and listening to His voice in the depths of our hearts." (Mother Teresa)

Many times, I pray about the things I see a lot. I pray that God would deliver the addict from the sickness that they suffer from. I pray for the soldier who suffers with PTSD who is trying to support a family while dealing wih the trauma of things from the past.  I pray for the family who wonders where they will spend Christmas. There are plenty of things that I lay at the cross daily and I thank God for always hearing my prayers, even when my unbelieving mind struggles to believe what my heart knows to be true.

But today, I learned from the smallest prayer warriors, that I need the faith of a child. The kind of faith that comes with no filters, no expectations; just simply the urge to throw myself at the foot of the cross and bask in the glory of the God who calls me there.

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”

He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.

  — Matthew 18:1-5

His plan is better.

"To have God speak to the heart is a majestic experience, and experience that people may miss if they monopolize the conversation and never pause to hear God's responses." (Charles Stanley)

Many of you know that for the past few months, we have anxiously held out for the right job to come along for my husband. Stepping out in faith to continue serving in a ministry role that we had established at home, he boldly resigned his day job and set his sights on the calling we had received and began looking for employment elsewhere, believing that God was being clear about the path he had marked out for us. Within a week of giving notice to his employer, a call came from the Ministry center about a potential position that God would eventually set me in. Four months later, when people say to me, "How is your new job going," I continue to answer, "It is a personal gift from God that I believe  brought me to the Conway Ministry Center." I still get teary eyed thinking about how I still feel chosen to be where I am and adopted as I have been from my new work family. 

I will admit that I had to contain my excitement when I received a call from my friend asking me if I would consider applying for the position because I simply wasn't looking for anything different. With my husband submitting applications everywhere, telling him that I was praying about the potential for a new job was awkward to say the least. I remember uttering during prayer, "but God, we were looking for him a job, remember?" I would later give God the praise for placing me where He could use me yet still worry about Jarett. Looking back, I see God in every part of the equation, but during the time, there were so many questions and concerns that I had. What did God have in store for Jarett, and for my family? 

A few months went by and finally, we thought we had secured a really good job with the government. It would be a great opportunity for our family and we would finally be able to regain some of the financial stability that had suffered while we sought employment. Just as we we had stretched as far as we could financially, we learned that the postal job would not be a possibility because of a misdemeanor charge that stemmed from something nineteen years prior. We were essentially back to square one.  We focused on a children's ministry opportunity that had been presented to us a few months prior and while the answer at the time wasn't clear, the God we believe in was. 

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,  and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:19-20)

The night that we were going to be leaving to go and work this children's ministry event, Jarett received a call from a friend of ours, wanting to meet over coffee and discuss something when we got back. It was that night that we received an offer that would change the downward financial spiral that we were embarking upon. Not long after Jarett began working from home with the new company that he was now independently contracted with, our son got sick. It has been through the many prayers that I am now able to recognize God's finger prints on everything once again.

It started the week before Thanksgiving with a simple cough. The coughing led to throwing up, and then fevers, and then body aches (mostly in the rib section from the constant cough) and then headaches. What appeared to be the flu has never been diagnosed as more than sinus drainage and in the two visits to the doctors office and one trip to the ER, he has coughed his head off for three weeks, running a fever about 75% of that time, causing him to miss school for virtually two weeks plus the week school was out for Thanksgiving. The scariest night came when his fever exploded to almost 105 and I watched him rapidly breath for an hour after throwing up and coughing into the wee hours of the morning. His health is improving slowly now but I sure do covet prayers for our little guy as we aren't all the way past this. 

As we were preparing to pray together during our staff meeting this week, the realization came upon me like a ton of bricks. God knew that Paxton would be getting sick. He knew that if Jarett had received the postal job, we would have been faced with decisions that he in his infinite wisdom has spared us from. He paved the way where there was none, and he brought us to the place where we can't do anything but embrace the gift he gave us daily. 

I know many people who are waiting on God to answer prayer. I have friends who are desperate for employment, for the health of their family members to improve, for their marriages to be saved. I know what it looks like to walk in the unknown, but I can say with assurance that God has a plan and we must trust Him, even when we don't see what it is. A dear coworker said to me, on the day that we got Jarett's first paycheck from his new job, this: "I pray for the kind of faith that can send an empty fork to an empty plate and it will not return empty to my mouth because of the provision God provides." 

I pray for that kind of faith too, my friend. And not just because I see it, but because I trust the provider and His plan for my life.