By Melody Vanosdol
God is always faithful. I’m still working on it.
We may not always realize that we are praying. Simply crying out, “no!” or pleading, “why me?” God hears. And He cares.
I remember the first time I realized ‘shouting’ to God was a prayer. As always, I had multiple projects going on around my home. I was pulling weeds out in my vegetable garden. The soil was wet, but not muddy, so when I pulled on the tall clover, it came up, roots and all, emphasis on all, opening up the back-end of a ground hornets’ nest. Given my response time, I must have been daydreaming. First, they started stinging my hands. Then I was completely swarmed.
I ran for the house screaming, “Father!” over and over. I was scared. I had only been stung once in my life (in my 30’s) and had no idea how multiple stings would affect me. As I ran to the back door, both it and the porch were almost completely blocked with saw horses and ceiling tiles—the other project I was working on. I did NOT want to slow down! I did manage to get inside and called my mom from the kitchen while I stripped down trying to kill the two hornets that were inside my clothing. (By the way, it is false to think they can only sting you once. A hornet can sting until it loses its stinger.) Thankfully, I wasn’t allergic to their stings, but my hands were very swollen for a couple days.
I learned two things from this experience.
- I could run, scream, and pray all at the same time.
- Crying out to my Holy Father had reached a level of automaticity.
Automatically running to God reveals that our faith has reached a deeper level. We don’t have to summon faith or call it up. It’s automatic. Knowing deeply in our spirit that we can rely on God for anything is life altering. He will never let us down. He may not give us what our flesh desires, but he will always give us what we need.
The closer we grow to God the more we will consider Him first. It all begins with wanting to get to know Him. We do that through God’s Word. The more we read or listen to stories in the Bible, the more we realize that the people in the Bible were human just like us. That makes it easier to understand that if God was there for them, He will be there for us too. There are two kinds of people in the Bible, those who trusted God, and those who didn’t.
The more we go to Him, the more we will get to know Him. The more we get to know Him, the more we will realize that we can run to Him and trust Him with anything. Eventually, we don’t even think about what to do. A simple sigh, or a single tear—he understands. He hears the pleading of our heart. The Holy Spirit intercedes for us, whether our heart is broken or we are running from hornets. We can trust him.
God is always faithful. I’m still working on it.
“But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one” (Matthew 6:6-13).
“Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up” (Luke 18:1).
“Jesus said, “Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you” (Luke 11:9-10).
“In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence” (Ephesians 3:12).
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