You may be praying wrong

Our adult group sends out prayer requests through email a few times a week. As I am sure is the case with many such groups, these requests primarily revolve around physical and financial issues- someone is sick or injured, or someone is in need of a job. Pretty standard stuff. With this mindset of community prayer, as I was reading through the book of Colossians, I was struck right off by what Paul prayed for. Early on in Chapter 1 vs 9 he declares his prayer for the recipients of his letter-

“we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God,”

He prayed-

• That they would be filled with the knowledge of His will, through all spiritual wisdom and understanding

• In order that they might live a life worthy of the Lord.

  It is interesting what he did not pray for. He did not pray for a change in their circumstances or improvement in their earthly condition! I wonder if that is why he prayed they would “get” God's will. Makes sense to me, as recognizing and understanding that my current crummy state is in fact God's will for my life is definitely going to require a wisdom I do not currently have!

Wonder also, if Paul was hinting that God's will for us is something that is different than what we would think or expect. Paul seemed to have a much better understanding of the long term will of God, His eternal plans and design, and a greater ability to live his life with that in mind. In fact, it seems that Paul's ability to endure all of the ridiculous abuses and persecutions he faced came about as a direct result of his ability to place things in the correct eternal context.

This is suggested by the second part of Paul's prayer, his reason for praying for understanding of God's will, “that they might live worthy lives”. Worthy means “appropriate”. He wanted the Colossians to live like the children of God that they were.

In the office I had a conversation with a Christian who is an alcoholic. The patient had been trying to serve God, but continued to battle a drinking problem, one day teaching a youth Bible study, the next day downing a whole bottle of wine after dinner. As I tried to encourage the patient, I shared my favorite line from the Lion King- the scene where the “ghost” of Simba's father says to him, “Remember who you are.”

I shared, “Remember who you are, you are a child of Almighty God, chosen by Him from all eternity to be his child. God wants you to live like it!”

As we talked, it was clear that part of the reason for the drinking was a focus on earthly struggles which distracted from a true understanding of the eternal will of God. And that the correct prayer was not simply, “Help the drinking stop”, but rather, “Give a full understanding of your Person and your eternal will, the perspective that will allow this person to live a life worthy of you, a life free from alcohol and focused on your kingdom.”

I need to pray better! How about you?

Mourning a patient's loss

In my first blog post I shared the story of how listening to my “gut”, that quiet voice of disquiet inside, led me to diagnosing a blood clot in a patient.

I have not seen the patient in several weeks, I found out why today when her husband came in for a visit. Just a few weeks after I made the clot diagnosis, she died. The clot was not a result of air travel as I had thought but was instead due to lung cancer that had spread through out her body. Before he even had a chance to make sense of the diagnosis (if one can) his 54 year-old wife of 19 years was gone.

I was stunned when he told me, rendered speechless (which is quite a feat). She had seemed so healthy and alive.

As we talked I was amazed at how well he was doing. I should not have been so surprised as he is a man of very strong faith with a firm assurance that he will see his wife again. What a blessed hope he has.

Today was a reminder of how brief life is. James describes it well, “You do not know what your life will be like tomorrow, you are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away” (James 4:14 NASB).

Let's savor every moment that God gives us, honor Him day by doing our best to live for Him and love for Him every chance we get, for who knows how many chances we have left.

I am not ashamed to admit that I was in tears today, I was deeply moved at his loss. He and his family will be a part of my prayers this Christmas, and hopefully a part of yours as well.

An annoying patient... how should I respond?

I received an email from a patient over labor day weekend. It read, “It is totally my fault for not scheduling sooner, but my son needs a sports physical so he can participate in workouts this week. I don't want to take him out of class, so I would like an appointment after 3:15.”

My initial response was. “Seriously?”

The schedule was already packed. I only had 3 afternoon appointments left for the short week, which would certainly quickly fill with patients who had unexpected needs such as illness or injury.

I issued a prompt denial via email saying I did not have any openings, defending my stance by reasoning, “It's her fault, she failed to plan!”

That, to me, was the issue. She made the mistake, and now she was asking my office staff and I to bail her out. I was miffed, and I replied to her message saying we did not have any afternoon appointments available. I marinated in my miffed-ness for a few hours, and then realized that my schedule really was a mess. I looked again at the schedule for the week and saw that I needed to add appointments. I did not have enough openings to meet the normal demands of a short post-holiday week. I told the staff I would give up my Wednesday morning off. Since I then had 10 extra slots for the week I had my receptionist call her and offer one of the openings Wednesday morning, or an afternoon opening the following week. It wasn't what she wanted, but it was really the best I could do.

What I didn't do that I would have done 5 years ago is give her a lecture on how unreasonable she was! (not that the thought didn't cross my mind!).

While my initial thoughts were more annoyed than gracious, I hope my ultimate response was appropriate and reflective of how I would want to be treated in a similar circumstance. Isn't this what the Golden Rule is about? Treating others as we would want to be treated? Grace is difficult, and does not come easily to me even in small matters, but I am learning!

I dare you to disagree with this political post!

I am a political junkie. My morning routine includes reading a number of political blogs and I have rather strong feelings about the path our nation should take. I have also learned the hard way on Facebook that my political opinions are not universally shared, so I avoid making political comments on social media and on this blog. I am about to break this rule, for there is one truth about politics that needs to be addressed- It is not that they are all selfish egotistical liars (which may also be true!) it is that all believers, regardless of political persuasion, should be united in one response to our leaders in government- we are all supposed to pray for them.

The apostle Paul gives specific advice on how and why to pray for those who lead us in 1 Timothy 2- “ I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone- for kings and all those in authority, that we may lead peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth.” (niv)

Paul uses four different words to describe the prayers we are to make and thereby makes it clear that we are to completely pray for our leaders. We are to make all sorts of requests on their behalf- we are to pray for them personally, pray for them physically, and to give thanks for God's sovereign influence in their lives.  Paul goes on to declare the goal of our prayers- the salvation of our leaders, for he writes that God desires that all men be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth.

Paul also gives a personal reason we are to pray- that we may lead peaceful and quiet lives. The two Greek words translated “peaceful” and “quiet” refer to two types of tranquility, the peace that comes from outside of us and the peace that comes from the inside. When applied to the church as a whole, this has profound meaning. The goal of our prayers is to minimize conflict with those outside of the church and to minimize conflict between those within the church! What a concept!

Think about it- If through prayer we focused more on the eternal than on the temporal, how different would our lives be? What if we cared more about the President's soul than his politics? Or if we were concerned more about the distribution of the gospel than the distribution of material wealth? Imagine the change in our conversations if, the next time someone in our family of faith complained about a political leader, our reply was, “Let's pray for him, right now!”

If we cared as much about our nation's and our leader's spiritual futures as we do their political futures, our discourse would change dramatically, and the peace we experience from inside and outside would increase.

How to be thankful- Lessons from a Pilgrim

392 years ago, 53 settlers gathered together to celebrate the blessings of the harvest, and the greater blessing of life itself. When they left home many months earlier they had numbered 102; a difficult voyage, a brutal winter and widespread disease had reduced their number nearly by half.

The events at Plymouth in 1621 have great personal significance for me, for the spiritual leader of the 53 was Elder William Brewster, a devout man and my eleventh great-grandfather. The three day feast he and his flock celebrated that fall is considered to be the first Thanksgiving. There is little original documentation of the feast, as only two primary sources remain. One of the records is that of Edward Winslow, a Pilgrim who wrote of the events to those in his homeland. He closed his account with these words- "And although it be not always so plentiful, as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far from want, that we often wish you partakers of our plenty."

In his words are truths that are worth remembering when we gather with our loved ones this holiday.

1- It is not always plentiful. When we gather to feast, our gratitude increases when we consider that not everyone is as blessed, and that we may not always have been or may not always be as blessed ourselves.

2-"We are so far from want." We have been granted riches and plenty that are beyond the imagination of many alive today, blessings so great that it is difficult for us to even comprehend the poverty faced by others.

3- We have these blessings for one reason- The goodness of our God. Our blessings are not earned, are not the result of our effort or accomplishments. They are entirely the result of God's goodness. We are blessed not because of who we are, but because of who He is.

4- We should pray that others may also partake in the blessings we have received. Let us all take time to think of those less fortunate, pray God's blessings on them, and consider how we may share.