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When God answers your prayers while you intercede for others.

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When God answers your prayers while you intercede for others.

I plan to write two posts this week (an update on the lake house will follow on Wednesday) because I could not move forward without thanking each of you who commented or emailed following last week’s post, “What do you need to leave behind?”

Not only was I encouraged by your loving words and often, hard-earned wisdom but then, several of you chose to trust me with deep heartfelt, personal prayers.

Thank you for your vulnerability.

I was humbled and honored to pray for you.

And I did write individual prayers for each request – one prayer after the other – filling the remaining pages of one journal and cracking a new one as more of your prayers rolled in.

As I prayed for you…

As I prayed for you, the carefully written and meaningful words you posted to convey your hearts resonated with mine.

As I prayed for you, I visualized each situation and tried to be as specific as possible while making sure not to tell God how to manage His best for you.

As I prayed for you, I felt a great release – an unpacking of the burden I had so firmly strapped to my back.

Finally, as I prayed for you, the Lord began to reveal to me that my “What now?” was not an entirely innocent question after all.

It was as though I found a secret letter to God I tucked away; the one that spoke the truths in my heart, like:

“Surely, You have better plans for me than this.”

The next – be warned – was even worse:

“I’ve worked so hard. I’ve done the very best I know how to do, and it’s nothing to sneeze at; I deserve better than this.”

Realizing this, I cried. Buckets. My heart was not overflowing with love, joy and humility. Quite the contrary, it was filled with vile pride and selfish entitlement.

The words of Jeremiah 17:9 rang true: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (ESV)

Here a few of the comments you posted that resonated most deeply with me in my struggle:

“So, I want to leave behind my assumptions about what my life would be like at this point. God has been leading me deeper in my understanding of who I am in Him and my prayer is that I will find perceptible fulfillment in my relationship with Him.” – Lisa

“Most of us have never had the opportunity to reach the amount of people you do, and touch them the way you do. All of us deal with growing older while the dynamics shift our value doesn’t – we just have to become more comfortable with it.” – Ann

“To me, finding your voice and thus your audience is not prideful or self-centered. It is a process of growth that God uniquely has granted to us humans…we should, however, always use it in prayerful consideration, which it seems you’re doing. Your life is going through some dramatic shifts. God doesn’t ask us to do non-scary things, right?” – tpcelt

“I need to let go, walk away from, stomp on, and pray about my need to be recognized. For 12 years I worked in my chosen career and quickly became recognized for my work; it was a source of pride, and I hung onto it after I quit my job…my pride is left wandering; and I’m sad and feel a lack of purpose, or should I say it, a lack of recognition.” – Kristy

I have been ridiculously and unrighteously prideful and angry, and this weekend I surrendered it to the Lord because He knows I deserve nothing apart from His grace, but He loves me and provides for me anyway.

I’ll end this post with one last comment, which is a prayer in and of itself.

“So, I leave it up to Him and will let Him decide where I am to go and if I remain hidden for the rest of my life. All I am is His servant, and He gets to decide.” – Beth

Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.

Without the opportunity to pray for all of you, it may have taken longer for me to see what I needed to leave behind.

Praise the Lord.
Let’s all walk more boldly in Him!

(Don’t forget to watch your inbox on Wednesday for a lake house update. If you aren’t subscribed to receive my posts via email, you can do so by clicking here. Don’t worry, I won’t spam you. It’s typically one email/post a week.)

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
When God answers your prayers while you intercede for others.


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