I recently read how God is always there, always seeking to get our attention, always talking to us, but in the busy-ness of life we tend to over look this. I’m definitely guilty of that, even when I do respond to promptings by the Holy Spirit to pray for people.
We are currently going through a 40 Day Prayer & Fast time at our church. A couple of weeks ago during my prayer and bible reading time I was prompted to pray for a couple I’d not seen for at least a couple of years but probably much longer. They used to go to our old church and then shifted to another state to minister at a church there. I knew they’d been having challenges and we’d heard on the grapevine occasionally about things happening in their lives. But we weren’t close friends and we hadn’t maintained contact.
So, to be prompted to pray for them wasn’t because they were always on my mind and I knew it was not of my own thoughts. I prayed for them and that God is with them in whatever is happening currently and after my prayers for that day got on with my life. They didn’t enter my mind again… till this morning. Who should walk into my (new) church this morning but this couple and their children? I had an overwhelming feeling of joy and excitement about seeing them and fired heaps of questions at them – how long have they been back, how are they, where are they living, and so on. I didn’t know who to hug first and excitedly chatted to them and then moved off to sit in my usual spot but keeping aware of where they had sat in the auditorium.
The prompting came back within minutes for me to go sit with them and I walked around to see if there was a spare seat near them but there wasn’t, so I moved back to my seat and waited till the time for the children moved came, then I grabbed my things and moved over to that side of the building and sat with them. During the service I was reminded of the prayer and concern for them a couple of weeks ago and I shared it with the husband (because he was sitting next to me and because we had also worked together a few years ago and had some common ground and I felt we connected more) after the service, with tears filling my eyes.
I still don’t understand why I was so overwhelmed with emotion for this couple – we’d not been close friends but did know each other. We didn’t mix in the same circles and their children are very young – our’s are full grown – and yet I know I was prompted to pray for them and then totally excited to see them this morning. They’re trying to buy a home and once settled will decide on their new church home.
One more amazing thing in all this, the husband told me he was surfing the web during the week and came across my blog – I asked him which one? I own 12 🙂 He told me the one about my book and was thrilled to come across it. He doesn’t even know how he found it – so there you have it. God had me thinking about them and vice versa – amazing.
Whatever is happening I know that God was in it, and for them to turn up in the church I attend out of all the churches they could attend, I feel was a God-incident in itself – that coupled with the prompting to pray for them.