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“Call Home” – James 5:13-18
Pastor Jeremiah Ebeling – 11/16/2014 Good morning, Grace. My name is Jeremiah and I serve with the Student Ministry here at Grace
Covenant Church.
Years ago, when I left home to attend college at Texas A & M University, there were so many
uncertainties I had about life and what would come over the next 4 or 5 years. But there was one thing I
was absolutely certain about: I knew that my mom and dad wanted to hear from me while I was in
college. They wanted to talk to me. They made that abundantly clear. This was before I had a cell phone –
before life really had begun – so they handed me a prepaid phone card as I walked out the door and said:
Here son, use this to call us free of charge, whenever you want, from that phone that will be in your dorm.
When that phone card would run out, they would send me another one. Not only that but they carved out
30 minutes every Sunday evening so that they could talk to me, if I called. They did not say I had to call
but I knew they were hoping to hear from me. Then, even when we had those conversations, I spent the
vast majority of that 30-minute conversation talking about me. They listened so patiently. Usually it was
at the end of the conversation where I would remember to ask: Oh yeah, how about you guys? How are
you all doing? Good, good. Well, bye. Talk to you next week, maybe. I was such a jerk about it. But they
made it so easy for me to make that phone call. They did everything they could to take away every barrier
which might keep me from calling home, talking to them, and telling them what was going on. The reason
they did all this was because they love me. They wanted to be close to me and they wanted a relationship
with their son.
I know that every single one of you who have had a son or daughter who has been away from
home, off at college, or living out of state or country, you will stop anything when they call just to talk to
them and to see how they are doing. You will let be late to that appointment because you want to know
how they are doing. You want to hear their voice. You want to know if they need something from you
that you could help them with. That is true about us.
I don’t think you can understand or at least appreciate what James is going to say today in our
passage in the book of James 5 -- I don’t think you can appreciate it without this understanding that every
parent desperately wants to hear from their son/daughter when they are away from home.
Throughout Scripture God is trying to convince us that He wants to hear from us and He wants to
talk to us. For some strange reason, he yearns to know us and to be close to us. He has made it so easy on
God greatly desires to hear from us
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us, hasn’t He? It is wild how far He has gone to make that communication not just possible but effortless.
He said: You can call anytime, from anyplace, and it is absolutely free. When you are confused or
speechless and you don’t know what to say because you are angry or scared, no problem. I have a
translator for you. My Holy Spirit will speak on your behalf when you don’t know what to say on the
other end of that line. God has done everything He can to make it easy on us to sit and have a
conversation with Him.
At the center of the universe is a God who longs to know you, who longs to have a relationship
with you, and He has gone out of His way to make that easy and to remove every barrier that might keep
us from having that conversation with Him.
Today, we are going to be talking about prayer. There is a very good chance you know what
prayer is and how to pray. But the question James is asking in this passage is: Are you doing it? Are you
calling home regularly? Are you calling home often? Do you realize it is about a relationship?
James is going to walk through these seasons of the soul to say: No matter what season you are in,
would you pick up the phone and call home?
Look at the first season he talks about in verse 13.
James 5:13 Is any one among you in trouble? Let them pray.
Is everything you are doing going against the grain? Does it feel like no matter where you are turning, you
are running into a strong headwind? Are you in the middle of a temptation because of a trial you are in? If
that is the case, would you call home and talk to God about that? He wants to hear about that from you.
He is waiting for that call.
It is not an issue of knowledge; He knows what is going on. That is not the problem but rather He
wants to hear it from us. He wants to be close to us and He wants us to share that with Him.
So many times, I don’t think to do that. I just assume – I’m not sure all I assume – but one is that
God doesn’t want to be bothered with this. He is busy, like running a universe. I will just take care of this
one myself. This one will be on me.
We approach prayer as if God were the President. I bet that none of you has ever had a problem
and thought: I am going to call the President to let him know what I am going through and see if he will
help me. None of us has done that, right? Now, unless you are the next Joe the Plumber and it is almost
election time, you will not be hearing back from the President. Even if he were down the road giving a
James 5:13 If troubled, then pray
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speech down on campus, you couldn’t just run up to him and tell him about how your car won’t start
again. He is not going to listen to all of your little problems. He has bigger issues that He is dealing with.
The President doesn’t have time for you. Unless you are the President’s kid, right?
Can you imagine if that was you underneath that desk and you came to your father, the President, and
said: Dad, it was another rough day at school today. Remember that kid I told you about who keeps
picking on me, messing with me, calling me names, and pushing me around? He gave me a hard time
again today and so it was a tough day. – What would your dad, the President, say? He would say: I am so
sorry, little buddy, to hear that. Look, I want to make sure that kid doesn’t ever mess with you again. No
one will ever hear from that bully or his parents ever again. Ever.
Look, God cares about what you are going through. Yes, He is running a universe but that is not
His most important job. He is also your Dad.
James says: Don’t think that whatever you are going through is too small for Him. That is a crazy
thought. Don’t think: I will wait until something big comes along. The reality is that we have never gone
through something too big for God, right. We have never prayed to Him one that is too big for Him. It is
all small stuff to Him. This is the God who invented quantum physics. I will bet He could figure out a
solution to your problem. Just let Him in there. Do you know what you get to do when you have had a
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rough day, when you are troubled or suffering, you get to run into His office, past all the staff. You don’t
even have to look at them. It doesn’t matter what they think. You run straight to your Dad, crawl up into
His lap and tell Him: Dad, I have got some problems. Would You please help me?
James is pleading with us, saying: When you are in trouble or having a tough day or you are in the
middle of some incredibly painful event in your life, would you talk to God about that? Would you pick
up the phone and call Him? He is waiting on the other end of that line to hear from you.
It is not just when you have this thorn in your flesh that you are coming to God, asking Him to
remove it – and sometimes He will remove it and other times He will leave it because He knows
something you don’t – it is not just those times when you are in trouble. No, and he swings to the other
side of human experience. Look, when you are happy or having an amazing day, pray then too. Thank
God for that.
James 5:13b Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise.
So, is life going well? Have you had an outstanding day? Did you have an amazing date last night? Is that
home project you have been working on for months, is that finally finished? Did you make it through an
entire dinner without any of the kids fighting or screaming or going to time out? Did you make it through
an entire dinner without cussing at your kids? Then celebrate that and say: Thank You, God, so much for
giving us a great meal together.
James says, no matter where you are, whatever you are going through, you say Thank you to God
for that. You let Him celebrate that with you because that is a gift from Him.
James 1:17 Every good and perfect gift comes from above.
Whatever it was, He is the one who brought it into your life.
You can sing; you can pray; you can talk to God through these songs of praise. If you are out
driving around, turn the music up, no matter how old you are. Sing out to God. If people are driving by
you thinking you are crazy, just wave to them and say: Sing with me. Here comes the chorus. Celebrate it
and talk to God and sing out to Him. Say, thank You, God, for this incredible day You have given us.
Why does he say this? I think he is reminding us because prayer is not just about petitioning God
for help. I will bet we all have a friend or family member who we only hear from when they are in the
middle of some difficult ordeal in their life. They are going through something traumatic or hard. But
when life is good, we don’t ever hear from them. We all have these friends. And I bet you do not love that
about them. In fact, when you see their name come up on the phone, there is a good chance you are
James 5:13b In your happiness, pray.
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thinking: I am going to answer this time up front: I am so sorry you lost your job again. I want to get right
to it because that is where we are headed, or it is something like that. We don’t appreciate it because it is
not a real relationship. It makes you feel a little used. I will bet God doesn’t appreciate it either.
In the college prep course that the Student Ministry does every spring with our graduating seniors,
we tell them: Look, guys, don’t just call home to talk to your mom and dad when you need some money.
That is a big mistake. What you need to do is call home when you are having a great day to just chat, to
tell them you have aced the test; or if school is not going that well, call them to tell them you passed the
test. Maybe that is the highlight of your semester. If you are in the middle of the cafeteria, eating lunch,
and you realize what an incredible cook your mom actually was all those years, you call her to thank her
for that. Wow, I appreciate your having kept me fed with such quality food for so many years. If you are
stuck on the side of the road, you call dad and say: You were an excellent mechanic after all. By the way,
could you come pick me up because I am broken down, again.
Mom and Dad, are you getting those phone calls from your grads yet? Then we need to keep
working on that.
It is the same with God. He does not appreciate just hearing from us when we are in trouble. He
doesn’t just want to be your fireman, putting out all your little fires. He doesn’t just want to be your
banker, wiring you money when things are tight. He doesn’t just want to be your shrink, there to help you
when you are thinking crazy thoughts again. It is so much more than that. He wants that relationship. Are
you in trouble? Are you happy? James is pleading with you that no matter where you are, whichever
season you are in, pick up the phone and call Him. He wants to hear from you. So, the next time you are
walking into an important business meeting and you are a little nervous about it, or you walk out of a
doctor’s appointment and you just received some spectacular news, pick up the phone and call home to
tell God thanks or to please help.
James says: It is not just when you are in trouble or just when you are happy, also call home when
you need some healing, too. Call when you are sick.
James 5:14 Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over
them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord.
What do you do when you are sick? You call home. I bet you remember that first time you were away
from home and you got sick. Who was the person you wanted to talk to or be there with you? It was mom
because for 18 years, she was the one who nursed you back to health. Even if she was hundreds of miles
James 5:14 In your sickness, pray
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away and could not be there to help, just talking with mom was soothing and helpful. That is part of what
James is saying here.
When you are sick, talk to the God who invented health. In just talking to Him, there is healing in
that but He actually knows how to make you better. He can do that. Would you talk to Him about that and
bring that sickness to Him to say: God, please help me with this.
If you have been praying for a while, you can also invite the elders – these older men in the faith
to whom God has given the responsibility of the church – to pray for you. One of the things I love about
the elders here at Grace is that between the services here on Sunday, often times they will meet with
somebody who has some serious ailment or a terminal disease, and they will dab some oil on their
forehead just like this passage says. Then they will lay their hands on the sick person’s shoulders to pray
some wonderful prayers of healing over these people. It is so cool to be a part of that. If you ask one of
these elders, they will tell you incredible stories of healing that we have seen right here at Grace through
those times of prayer. We have seen God act.
James is saying: It is not just the elders you might ask to pray for you. Before you go there, why
not ask your spouse, a friend, your life group to pray for you.
James 5:16 Pray for each other so that you may be healed.
So you start there. You also can ask the elders if you still want them to pray for you. But James tells us
why we ought to pray for others and to be prayed for ourselves.
James 5:15 The prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well. The Lord will raise
them up.
In some mysterious way – don’t understand how it works – our prayers to God impact His will.
They intersect with the divine will somehow.
I spent 3 ½ years at seminary and I didn’t even come close to getting an answer to that question of
how does that happen. How does this really work? What I do know, what Scriptures says, what James
says is that God takes those prayers into consideration as He makes His decisions. He allows our prayers
to affect the decisions and even His will. Isn’t that cool? James says – don’t worry about the how; just do
it; just pray, would you? God is waiting to pick up that phone.
We often times think that “prayer offered in faith” is a prayer of absolute certainty, that you
can’t have any doubts and that is the only way the prayer will work. But if it is not answered, then
James 5:15 Our prayers impact His will
James 5:16 Invite believers, elders to pray for you
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what are you left thinking? You are wondering: Okay, somebody is doubting here. Who is it? Is it you
because it is not me?
Or, we look at “prayer offered in faith” as this prayer that is kind of a command, where you
are not talking to God but you are talking to the sickness. You tell the sickness: I rebuke you. Get out. We
see that Jesus did that but He never told us to do that. I don’t think it is either one of those.
I think you see a wonderful example of “prayer offered in faith” in Mark 9:17-24 where you see a
father coming to Jesus. He has a son who is demon possessed.
The father says: Would you please heal my son?
Jesus basically asks him: Do you believe that I can?
The father says: I do believe but would You help my unbelief? Help me overcome the part of me
that does not believe You can do this.
What does Jesus do? He heals that son. He helps this father out too. The father was saying: I don’t
know; I have some faith that You can do this but I don’t. I have all these fears and doubts and questions
and I need as much help as my son does. Would You help me to have the faith? That is exactly what Jesus
does.
I think that is what a prayer offered in faith can look like.
One commentator of James says: “A prayer offered in faith is a very specific, very direct request.”
I think he is saying: You come to God and maybe you have friends with you or the elders, but you
come to God and in this prayer you say: God, would You heal this person of this ailment? Would You
make them better?
We have lots of uncertainties and questions. We don’t know how this is going to happen or how
You would do this. We don’t even know what is causing this. But what we do know is that You are the
only one who can do something about this. So, would You? We ask with all of our doubts and all of our
fears and questions and the things we don’t know and we are uncertain about. We ask with the little faith
that we do have; however much that is, we bring that prayer offered in faith and present that direct,
specific request to God. I think that is what James is asking us to do.
James invites us to pray that God would use the wonderful medicine and doctors that He has
provided to us, that He has gifted us. I say that when he says:
James 5:14 b … He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him
with oil …
James 5:14b Anoint with oil
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Because oil had medicinal value. When you look at the parable of the Good Samaritan, he takes the
injured man and applies oil to his wounds because oil was used to sooth an aching body and to heal
wounds.
So, James says: Pray that God would use this medicine that He has come up with, that He has
helped us to develop to heal that body.
But you also pray for a miracle, saying: God, would You act against the laws of nature here. You
made those laws; would You suspend them; would You act directly and miraculously. Before this person
even sees a doctor or gets any medicine, would You act now to heal them? I ask You to do that.
We can pray both of those prayers. Those are prayers offered in faith, James says.
We don’t know how all this works but what we do know is that outside of the Bible, there is so
much empirical evidence. I have done some reading on this recently. It is a little strange when you look at
all the evidence out there that a prayer offered in faith changes things. God chooses to act on those
prayers. It has been a little spooky. I want to share some that I found and especially enjoyed.
One was from a book called “The Survivor’s Club” written by Ben Sherwood, which is all about
survival, people who have survived these terrible diseases or ordeals in their lives. This intelligent author,
educated at Harvard and was a Rhodes scholar at Oxford, wrote that as he was preparing to write this
book, he did not plan to say anything about prayer or faith. I don’t think he believed in those things. But
as he interviewed hundreds of people about how they survived some crazy event, some life threatening
situation, 80% of them attributed their rescue to God saving them or getting them out of that situation or
healing them. They attributed their rescue to surviving to God doing something, or responding to some
prayer they had prayed. This author decided that he had to include a chapter in this book, which ended up
being Chapter Six: “Rescued from the Lion’s Jaws: Prayer, Miracles, and the Power of Faith”. This
author discovered, against his own convictions, that it is good for your health to talk to God about your
health.
There is a study back in 1999, and maybe some of you have heard of this, about people who go to
church and do things like pray to God regularly. The study discovered that people who do this, who are
spiritual, have a relationship with God or are pursuing God in some way, they live 7 years longer than
people who do not do this. They found that there is this connection between our relationship with God and
spirituality and with longevity of life. It affects not just your soul but your body, too. What I loved about
this study, what was significant about it, is it was conducted just down the road at the University of Texas.
Empirical evidence that prayer offered in faith affects the outcome
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So you know these results are not fabricated. Or maybe they are fabricated. They might have discovered
that you actually live 20 years longer, not just 7, but they could not stomach that.
What I am trying to convince you of is that prayer offered in faith makes a difference. God takes
that and He uses it and decides to act on those prayers at times.
I saved my favorite two for last.
In one study, they took 400 cardiac patients and separated them into two groups. For 200, they had
somebody praying for them who was a complete stranger. For the other 200, they were not prayed for at
all. For the 200 who were prayed for by a stranger, didn’t even know they were being prayed for, they had
fewer complications, fewer cases of pneumonia, needed less drug treatment, and they left the hospital
earlier. Man, you would hope you were in the right half of that study.
The last is at Columbia University where they did a study on in vitro fertilization patients over in
Korea. They gathered folks from different continents (from the U.S.A., from Canada, from Australia) and
they gave them the name of some person or family over in Korea, again complete strangers 5000 miles
away. The in vitro patients were again split into two groups. Half were prayed for and did not know they
were being prayed for. The other half was not prayed for. What they found with this half, which was
prayed for by strangers, the pregnancy success rate doubled. That means that an 82-year old woman in
Montreal, Canada was praying for a 25 year old in South Korea would get pregnant and it works. They
don’t even know each other. It is weird stuff, isn’t it? It is kind of spooky when you stop and think about
it.
I don’t know where you are with the Bible and what you think about God or how much you
believe about what is real. But I hope you hear this, no matter where you are in your faith journey – there
is scientific proof that it is good for you to talk to God about your health. In fact, there is scientific proof
that it is good for a stranger to talk to God about your health. You will find it in Scripture and outside of
Scripture that talking to God about your health is a good thing. These prayers offered in faith make a
difference.
This means you might be one phone call away from being healthy, well again.
James is pleading with us to do this, to pick up the phone and call home. Ask God to heal you, to
make you better. He is waiting on the other end of that line for that call to come in.
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Then James moves to something very interesting. He says there is a chance that you are sick physically
because you are sick spiritually. There is something broken in your soul which is causing a brokenness in
your body. Those two are connected.
James 5:15 And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will
raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.
:16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be
healed.
We are told that when we are sick, when we are seeking physical healing, one of the things we need to
make sure we are doing is examining our hearts to see if there is some unconfessed sin hiding out in our
hearts that needs to be addressed. I will bet you have experienced this before where you had headaches
from all the worry, or you are experiencing ulcers from all the fear in there, or you are listless and
depressed because of the anger and unforgiveness that you won’t let go of.
James says those are tied together and if you see something broken in your body, there is a good
chance that there is something broken in your soul. That might be happening. Our souls and our bodies
are hard wired with one another. There might be something malfunctioning in your heart that is causing
this brokenness in your body.
James says to confess to somebody and tell them what is going on and ask them to pray a prayer
of healing and forgiveness. And if somebody comes to you and their body or their soul is not well, then
you get to pick up the phone and make a call for them to ask God to restore them, that He would make
them well again. We get to be priests with one another in that way, James says.
James assures us that God will hear us when we say those prayers for ourselves or for somebody
else.
James 5:16b The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.
James is not saying that you need to get a little holier before God is going to hear you. No, because if you
look at verses 17 and 18 he is trying to encourage us.
James 5:17 Elijah was a human being just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not
rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years.
:18 Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.
Elijah’s prayers were heard. But when you look back at 1 and 2 Kings and you read about the life of
Elijah, the story of this man, what you discover is that he was just like us. He was depressive and he got
James 5:15, 16 Soul health and physical health are connected
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scared and he doubted and he failed. He is no different than us. Do you know what he did do? He prayed
and called home. James says to be like Elijah and God will hear you just like He did for Elijah.
Would you pick up that phone and call home?
There was a film back in 2006 called “The Bridge” about the Golden Gate Bridge. The film is
about this majestic, beautiful bridge and yet that bridge has become the most popular place in the entire
world for people to end their lives. People come from all over the globe to this bridge and have this
romantic idea that they will dive off this bridge and just disappear into the midst.
However, that is not how it happens. What really happens is that you fall 240 feet in 4 seconds.
You hit the water at 75 mph and it shatters your bones, throwing bone shrapnel into all of your organs. If
you survive that fall, and it is unlikely that you will, then you sink 70 – 80 feet under water and in
excruciating pain you drown.
A coroner who has worked with some of those who jumped off this bridge says: It is not this
romantic little drifting off into oblivion. You land in crushing pain. Normally a corpse is kind of stiff like
a board but someone who has jumped off the bridge is like a sack of bb’s because they have destroyed
their interior structure.
Why am I telling you this? First, if you ever consider ending your life, please don’t.
Second, there was a young man, Kevin Hines, who was 19 years old and he had a lot of hurt in his
past. He was bipolar and didn’t even know it. But what he did know was that every single day there was a
voice in his head that kept telling him what a loser he was. One day, Kevin woke up and he could not
quiet that voice any longer. So he decided to get on a bus that would take him to the Golden Gate Bridge
so that he could jump off.
He tells this tragic story about how he gets on the back of that bus and he is crying the whole way.
He was longing for somebody to come back and talk to him, to check on him to see if he was okay. He
was longing for somebody to make eye contact with him. But nobody did. Then the bus driver finally
pulled the bus over and walked to the back of the bus. Kevin thought he was coming back to check on
him. But the bus driver came back there to kick him off the bus.
Kevin got off the bus and walked out onto the Golden Gate Bridge. He spent about 40 minutes
walking up and down the bridge, just sobbing, and not once did somebody ask him if he was okay. A
woman stopped him and asked him if he would take a photograph for her, which he did with tears
streaming down his face. Then she just walked off.
“The Bridge”
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He went to the edge of the bridge and he jumped. He said as soon as his feet left that bridge, he
thought: I don’t want to die. He said that for the first time in his life, even though he had avoided God his
entire life, he prayed saying: God, please save me. I don’t want to die today. He hit the water at 75 mph
and he immediately broke both of his legs, shattered two of his vertebrae and he started to sink. He
realized he was alive but as he was coming back up to the surface of the water he realized his legs were
not working. He thought: I have survived this fall from the bridge but now I am going to drown. He
prayed again and then he felt a little bump on his leg. He thought: Okay, I am not going to drown today
but I am going to be eaten by a shark. That little bump kept happening and kept his head above water, just
long enough for the coast guard to get there. Later, he realized it was a sea lion who was keeping him up
above the surface of the water. Spectators there confirmed the whole story. You can’t make this stuff up.
Kevin Hines lived that day. Do you know what he does now? He travels around, sometimes back
to the Golden Gate Bridge, to reach out to people who are in a desperate place. He sends some prayers
home for them; he prays with them; he just sits with them. He is saving lives. He is reaching out and
grabbing a phone for these people, saying: God, would You restore this person’s body --- would You make
their soul well again. That is what he does now.
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Our God is astonishing, isn’t He? He writes some great stories, just like Kevin’s from time to
time. Will God let us die if we jump off of bridges? Yeah, He will. Usually, He respects our free will. But
our God also loves to work miracles, loves to forgive us, loves to heal us, and loves to save us. Even when
we are at the lowest point of our lives, when we are sinking into the darkest depths, when we cry out to
Him and plead with Him to save us, He loves to reach down and grab us and say: I am here and I will help
you. He does that. He is longing to hear from us, to listen, and to help us in whatever way we need. That
is our God, the God we worship. Will He always save us? No, He won’t but He will always be there. He
will always respond when we pray.
So, what James is pleading with us to do today is: Would you please just pick up that phone, no
matter what is happening in your life? Pick up that phone and call home. God cannot wait to hear from
you.
I have an older friend who told me that when he was in college, all four years, he would receive
letters from his mom every single week. In these letters, she would tell him how she was doing, ask him
questions, and then she would include in that envelope a pre-addressed, pre-stamped envelope and even
some stationery so he could write her back. Did he ever write her back in that four years? Not once. Was
he really that busy that he couldn’t tell mom how great of a day he was having, or how bad a day, or how
sick he was, or whatever was going on? He had lost sight of the fact that his mom loved him. She had
raised him and she just wanted to be close to him and hear from him. She wanted a relationship with him.
So, what are you going to do differently next week – when the kids are going nuts and turning the
house upside down? Would you pick up that phone and call home and say: God, I need some help right
now.
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Or, you are walking out of work and you just had a great review. Would you pick up that phone,
write that letter and say: God, thank You so much. Let God celebrate with you. He wants to do that.
If your body and soul are not well, would you talk to your Maker and invite Him in to help you
with that. He is waiting for that all because He loves you and wants to be close to you. He wants a
relationship with you.
Let’s call Him now and go to prayer.
Heavenly Father,
We thank You so much that You care for us, not as a distant God who cares just when it is
convenient or when You have time, but that You care for us no matter where we are in life, no matter
what we are experiencing.
Father, we ask that You would change our hearts, if that is what we need, and cause us to long for
You. That we would not come to You as somebody who is there when we are in a time of need, or we
need something from You – but You would draw us to yourself, Father, when we are at a low point, or we
have had an amazing day that we would come to you because we desire that relationship, that You have
so clearly said You want with us. I pray You would develop that heart in us.
I pray we would talk to You not just regularly but often, throughout our day, no matter what is
happening where we would invite You into that, sit and have a conversation with You, and that we would
love that, just as You do. In Jesus’ name. Amen