"Praise the Lord! This is an answer to...

faith!"?

Wait, no, you're supposed to get "answers to prayer," right? Because if you don't pray and ask God... well, yeah, He's omniscient and He knows the desires of your heart, but it says "pray without ceasing!"


When I woke up yesterday morning, I had two e-mails in my box. One was from Tech, saying I had a meeting with a professor scheduled for 10am on Wednesday; could I make it? The other was from a spa in Greenville asking if I could come in for an interview at 4 on Wednesday. I also got a response from one lady saying she would be available Wednesday night at 6:30 to show me the house she's trying to find herself a roommate for. Oh, and another spa called and when I told her I'd be in Greenville on Wednesday, she said, oh, well can you come in for an interview at 9am?

At this point, the "normal" Christian answer would be, "what an answer to prayer!" But as soon as I thought that, I thought... but I haven't even started praying about this. I mean, okay. In my journal entries I've asked for guidance and provision and said, "I'm scared out of my skin but if this is what You want me to do...." But driving around, lying in bed trying to sleep, quiet moments... the prayers have been casual conversations, not what I'd consider to be "prayer and petition." To be sure, I SHOULD be! And will, now, as this is such a good reminder. It's just so easy to wait until you're desperate to start praying with desperation.

But the more I thought about this quandary, the more this line of thinking sounded works-based. "God won't answer unspoken prayer, woman! Get on your knees and gimme 30 minutes of weeping and gnashing of teeth!" But why not? He surprises me with a breathtaking sunset on a bad day when He knows I need it... what's to stop Him from granting bigger unspoken requests?

Or maybe He just wants to make sure that I don't take any credit for it: "You have too many [soldiers] for Me to hand the Midianites over to you, or else Israel might brag: 'I did it myself.'" Judges 7:2 "*I* spent days in prayer and fasting on my face before the Lord! And He finally pulled through for me. Took Him long enough." He certainly doesn't owe me what I ask for; I've long thought prayer was much more to our benefit than it was to His, anyway.

It's grace. Unearned grace that I don't deserve. I just have to accept it and praise Him for it.