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Let
Go, Let God! |
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Two businessmen on the verge of bankruptcy,
were struggling to resolve their financial problems...
One was a rich man: big business. The other
was a man of modest means: small business.
The effort of each to save his business had
reached the point of desperation. They knew
from experience that it was of no use going
back to banks for help, since banks will only
lend money when you don't really need it. So
each man decided that the thing to do was go
to church and pray.
The
rich man went right up to the front pew and
prayed: "God, my business is going
broke and I need a million dollars to save it.
Omit the banks they won't help, but You have
control of all the money on earth, all the gold
in Fort Knox, all of the oil in the desert,
and all of the treasures of the world."
Then the poor man, kneeling in the second pew,
prayed, " God, my business is in trouble,
and all I need to save it is five thousand dollars." Whereupon,
the rich man turned to the poor man and said, "The
Lord has answered your prayer. Here is my check
for five thousand dollars. Go quickly and cash
it. And thank God for saving your business."
The poor man, check in hand, then left the
church praising God and the rich man again fell
to his knees and said, "Now Lord, if I
can have Your undivided attention!"
There are times in our lives when we are on
the verge of spiritual bankruptcy. There are
times when our minds are filled with questions
that seen unanswerable. "Who am I? What
is the real meaning of my life? How am I to
live my life? And we come to church in the
hope of getting God's undivided attention.
But don't you see? We don't have to ask for
it, we already have it. God is present at
all times.
A pastor apologized to his congregation one
Sunday morning when he appeared on the pulpit
with a large band-aid on his face. He said, "While
I was shaving this morning, I was thinking about
the sermon and I cut my face." Later, a
member of the congregation said to the pastor, "Why
not next time think about your face and cut
the sermon?"
If we spend all of our time thinking about
God and about prayer, in the formal sense, we'll
end up cutting our face when we're shaving,
driving the car off the road, burning the roast
in the oven, pushing the doors marked "pull," and
otherwise being in all kinds of trouble.When
Paul tells us to pray unceasingly
We need to understand that the word which we
translate into "without ceasing" cannot
be watered down. We cannot regard it as a pious
exaggeration we can disregard out of hand. The
word means, literally, to pray without ceasing.
It means to pray incessantly. It means to pray
continuously. It means to pray non-stop, without
interruption. It means to pray persistently.
But! Paul cannot have meant for us to be praying
all the time. And yet he meant what he said.
He meant for us to take him seriously.
Our formal prayer time must be regarded by us
as important. And, if we have taken this first
step, then we can move on to the second step:
praying without ceasing. This means that out
of our regular, formal prayer, the Power and
Presence of God will spill over into the rest
of our lives. It means that we will experience
and recognize God's Presence more-and-more in
everything we do. It means developing a lifestyle
in which we are open to the Power and Presence
of God in all things.
A little boy named Tommy loved to spend time
with his grandparents. The grandfather was retired
and had available the thing that children value
above all else: time ...
Grandfather had time to be with Tommy. On Tommy's
visits they would go to a ball game or go fishing,
or go to the zoo, or just sit around and be
with each other.
One day, when they were sitting in the sun,
fishing, Tommy said, "Pop-Pop, can you
see God?" Now grandfather had a way about
him of not always answering a question immediately.
He would think before he answered. This time,
however, he paused a long, long time, with a
faraway look in his eyes.
Tommy thought that grandfather hadn't heard.
So he repeated the question, "Pop-Pop,
can you see God?" Grandfather replied softly, "Tommy,
it's getting so lately that I don't see anything
else." Could it be that, in the twilight
of his life grandfather had actually learned
how to pray without ceasing?
We come to church for years, many of us. Over-and-over
again we listen to the same stories, sing the
same hymns, say the same prayers, and our spirits
become sleepy and lifeless. But one day it happens
...
Suddenly one Sunday you experience a breakthrough.
By some miracle, you are visited by an angel
of God, who whispers to your soul a message
of hope, a message of faith. "God is the
God of history! "The Kingdom of God is
within you," Suddenly, your lifeless spirit
is transformed into a powerhouse of outlandish
faith and hope. Suddenly, your sleepy spirit
is interrupted by the wildest expectation of
what God has in store for those who live in
harmony with His Will.
Suddenly, your tired spirit transforms every
aspect of your life into a prayer without end: "Let
go and let God ... Let go and let God ... Let
go and let God."
Blessings,
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