There was a time when I was having a problem with a woman I had to visit frequently.  Our personalities clashed often.  I did not think she was very Christ-like, which made my thoughts and attitude not very Christ-like either.

                Fervent Christian that I was, at least in my own opinion at the time, I prayed often about that situation, asking God to change the problem and move her away or move me!  I wanted to be gone!  “Please, Lord, get me out of here!”

                God did get me out.  He moved me to the other side of the world, nine thousand miles away!  After a near-death experience there, I grew to appreciate His care more than ever.  I pledged to grow in my Christian life.  I would like to say that from that time on, I never faltered, but you know that is not true.  I have tried to grow in my Christian life, and the Holy Spirit has helped me, but I have not yet arrived.

                Recently, I heard a minister mention Paul’s jailhouse prayer, and it made me curious.  During my Bible reading the next morning, I followed the story in Acts 16 about Paul and Silas in Philippi, near Greece.  After they had been beaten, the jailer put them into the maximum security cell and clamped leg irons on them.

                About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns.  Then, an earthquake shook the jail and every door flew open and all the prisoners were loose.  The jailer assumed the prisoners had escaped, but Paul told him no, they were all still there!

                That hit me.  Why didn’t they run?  I thought again about them praying and singing.  What were they asking in their prayers?  If they had been like me, like I did years ago, it would be, “Lord, get me out of here!”

                But when God opened the doors and broke their chains, they did not run.  Obviously, “Get us out of here,” was not what they had prayed.  They must have asked instead, “Lord, come in here and stay with us!”

                God had someone in that jail who needed Him.  By asking for God’s presence, Paul and Silas were able to lead the jailer and his entire family to faith in Jesus.  That was the start of Christianity in Europe!

                Quickly, I bowed my head and cried for God’s forgiveness for my selfishness.  Instead of praying for God to stay with me through that difficult storm, help me work out the differences I had with that woman,  help me show His love for her, and help me let my light shine, I had focused on me and my woes.

                That woman needed God, and perhaps I needed Him more at the time also.  There were times I said and did things when I would not have asked for Jesus to accompany me.  I would not have been comfortable if I could have actually seen Jesus there with me.  Perhaps God had placed me with her to help both of us and to lead both of us closer to Him.

                I want to be more like Paul, singing and praying like him.  Why?  Because Paul said, “Imitate me because I imitate Jesus.” 

                My daily prayers begin now with thanks for my salvation and then I ask God to stay with me all day and lead me to do whatever tasks He has for me this day.  I hope I never ask God to get me out if He wants me to stay to work and shine. 

                May God increase our faith and our strength.

 

Joyce Smith Broyles is a retired High School Library Teacher.  She resides in Jennings, LA.