The Other Book

Some of us are inclined to get weepy over a movie or book. There's a book I open nearly every day which can bring on something between moist eyes and a waterfall. The Bible does that for sure. But there's also the other book.

My prayer journal.

At some point, my prayer list got too long too pray through every day and began frustrating me. Then I heard the suggestion of organizing prayer lists by days of the week. Voilà! Intercession became manageable with a small divided binder.

The journal holds an assortment of lists. Who's on them?
• my husband and children
• family (people related by natural blood or Christ's blood)
• martyrs, ministries, missions (both organizations and individuals)
• friends who glorify God through the arts and writing (including online)
• the weak, the unsaved world, widows and orphans
• church and government authorities

(Each one of you is in there. Your name may appear for a specific reason. But I also pray for every person who visits this blog—even those looking for something else online—asking God to draw you closer to Himself through the words here.)

The single page tucked inside the cover is a priority list, where I pencil in a few people at a time with pressing needs. That list changes as situations do. Other lists are altered as prayers are answered, or when I release some situations to God in order to give attention to new ones.

But some people stay in this book ...

We met Rachel years ago when my then-teenage niece visited for a week and asked to bring a friend. I prayed that our home would minister to these two young women, both living vulnerable lives in unstable homes. At week's end, Rachel cried and said she didn't want to leave. She left our home but not my heart. I've been able to learn nothing more of her.

Charles was the soft-spoken police officer who slim-jimmed my locked car back in the 90's when I left the keys inside—something I've done only twice my whole life. I felt moved to ask this departing stranger how I might pray for him (another infrequent occurrence). In a broken voice, he told me his brother just committed suicide. God allowed me to bump into Charles again last spring, shortly before a sudden illness took his life. Only then did I take Charles off the list, with hope we meet again in answer to the many prayers said for him.

I don't know Zechariah's real name, or if he's even still alive. Our paths crossed for only a moment nearly two decades ago at an inner city church. A rough looking woman dragged the preschooler out of the sanctuary for making noise during the service, then threw him against a wall where he crumpled to the floor. I had a baby in my arms and stepped away to collect my husband, that we might intervene. Those few seconds were all it took for her and the tyke to vanish. I pray for him as Zechariah because it means "Remembrance of YHWH."

"As for Me, I am unable to forget you.
See, I have inscribed you on My palms."
~ Isaiah 49:16 (author)

Knowing that God answers prayer keeps me praying.

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Copyright 2011, Anne Lang Bundy, all rights reserved.