praying

Have you seen the documentary "Father of Lights"?  If not, you should.  It's inspiring.  The documentary captures amazing stories of people surrendering to the Spirit and following His lead in ministering to other people.  You see a man pray for someone to be healed and they are healed!  The first time I watched this documentary last summer I felt awakened in a deep way.

In the last couple of years I've felt more and more convicted about prayer.  Prayer is absolutely essential.  There is so much power in intercessory prayer.  Last summer I made a prayer notebook that I started praying through daily.  I also pray the verse Ephesians 1:17-19 over me and Rollin everyday, and I have seen those prayers answered more and more.

But I want to go a step further.  I want to yield to the Holy Spirit and start going out of my comfort zone by praying for other people.  I am reading a book by Jim Cymbala called "Spirit Rising."  He talks about how there's a difference between being born-again and being born-again surrendered to the Holy Spirit.  A couple of weeks ago I asked myself "have I really surrendered my life and my time to the Holy Spirit?"  With full-time teaching I'm away from the house from 6:30 in the morning until 5:00 in the evening, plus Rollin and I are on the leadership team for our home group...so life's pretty busy.  I've realized whenever I have downtime...it's MY time.  I don't want to even yield my free time to Jesus because it's MINE and I'm exhausted.

Ouch.  So I prayed "Jesus, I do want to surrender to Your Spirit, help me."  And He replied, "I want you to spend your date night with Rollin on campus praying for people."

My response, "Nooooo!!!!!!!!"

Date night is the one week night I get to relax.  I tried to ignore it, but I couldn't so I confessed this to Rollin. Four days later it was date night and we were driving to campus.  Neither of us really felt like going to campus to pray for people, but we obeyed.

We walked to a fountain and sat down for a while.  A young man sat across the way on a bench.  After a little while Rollin decided to go over and talk to him and pray for him while I stayed and prayed for the young man.  I felt alive.  When Rollin returned he said he thought we could go and get dinner and we began walking  back to the parking garage.  Within 10 feet I saw another guy standing waiting for the bus and something hit my spirit.  I knew Jesus wanted us to talk to this man.  I almost ignored it as we walked by him but Rollin stopped because he was sending a text message.  I blurted it out.  "That guy over there, I think you need to pray for him."

Rollin walked over to the guy and I spend the next 10 minutes (at least) praying for this guys.  When Rollin came back he told me I was right...that Rollin was supposed to talk to that guy.  Rollin felt very strongly that this man was the man Jesus wanted us to pray for.  It was soooooooooo cool!

Fast forward a week, to this week's date night.  I came home and Rollin immediately escorted me upstairs where he washed my feet and massaged them.  Okay that part isn't really needed in this story but I wanted to praise and honor my husband.  Marriage has been hard this year.  But we have grown together in so many beautiful ways I wouldn't trade it for anything.

We went out to eat at a central american restaurant.  It was very small and I think the air conditioner was broke because it was warm in there and there were standing fans in each corner.  The man that waited on us couldn't speak English well and besides him there was only one other guy in the kitchen.  This was small.

So we ordered and as we were waiting for our food Rollin said, "I want to pray for that guy (our waiter)."  When the man came over to give us our food Rollin asked him if he was the owner of this restaurant.  It took a few times of Rollin asking because he didn't understand at first.  When he finally said he was the owner Rollin said "Can I pray for you?  I want to pray for you and bless your business."  This man's face lit up.  Rollin prayed and after he prayed this man was so cheery and happy.  I could tell he was really blessed.  And all it took was just having the guts to step outside of our comfort zone.

I don't know how to conclude this, but I want more of this.