It’s summer time! Oh wait. I have to teach summer school for the second straight year. Maybe I shouldn’t be that excited. Last year, I missed out on a vacation with the family to Mammoth, a beautiful place I’ve never been to. Sweet. Of course I had a close encounter with God while teaching nine boys with Autism. Go figure.
Despite teaching summer school again, I always have goals that I set for myself for the summer time (e.g., How much can I bench press? How high can I jump? How much can I improve my shot? How could I read the pick-and-roll better? How many books can I read off my “must read” list? How many people can I dunk on? Okay, I made that last one up but you get the point.).
I recently finished 2 Samuel and at the end of the book, king David angered the Lord for “numbering the people” (2 Sam. 24:1). The Lord sent a pestilence (an Angel) that killed 70,000 people. David admitted that he did something foolish (ya think?) and built an altar to the Lord. David then sought to purchase a sacrifice off a guy named Araunah. Araunah offered it to David for free but David said, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God which cost me nothing” (24:24). The rest of the chapter goes:
David built there an altar to the Lord and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. Thus the Lord was moved by prayer for the land, and the plague was held back from Israel (24:25 - emphasis added).
I was, again, amazed that God could actually be moved by our prayers. In addition, my church is starting a preaching series on Prayer. So far, it’s been extremely helpful. My prayer life has always been inconsistent and at times, a downright struggle. So this summer, instead of having goals that really don’t mean that much in the eternal picture of things, my goal is to bolster my prayer life in a way that my soul will benefit as much as my body does from hours at the gym.
The elders of my church have done an outstanding job of teaching us about prayer. Instead of giving you an exposition on prayer right now, let me just tell you that it’s a struggle for me. If God weren’t real, there are still many benefits to being a Christian. There is a social benefit from meeting with people at church. There is an educational benefit from reading our Bibles. But if God weren’t real, then prayer makes no sense. At the core of my struggle is simply a lack of faith in believing that God truly hears my prayers and answers them (even though I don’t always like the answer).
I don’t know what bolstering my prayer life will look like or what “results” I’ll have. Maybe that’s the difficulty of it all. When I hit the weight room I not only see the results but I also feel stronger. I’ve gone through seasons in my life with rich prayer time but don’t “see” or “feel” any different. Maybe I’m not supposed to see or feel anything and simply believe that I’m honoring God with my prayer time. Even though I don’t have everything figured out, I know that through my prayer time, time in the Word of God, and listening to the sermons at my church it might all come to me. In the meantime, I’m just going to enjoy concentrating on praying for things I know I need to be praying for. And maybe that’s what it’s all about, simply enjoying that time with God and allowing your mind to meditate on things that really matter.
This may be especially true now that the NBA is headed towards a lockout and we might not even have a season next year. I even asked my wife, “What am I going to do if we lose the season to a lockout?” She replied, “Pay more attention to me or I’m locking YOU out.” Well then, without an NBA season I could simply devote myself to my wife, more prayer, and time in God’s word. Or maybe I’ll just pray that the lockout could be avoided completely. Either way, I know in the grand scheme of things that it’s the state of my soul and my relationship with Jesus is what matters, not the state of the NBA. Of course if the Lakers get Dwight Howard in a trade this summer, I’ll recant the previous paragraph.
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