Plane // Go where your best prayers take you

‘Go where your best prayers take you.’ That’s the tagline of the book Dirty Glory by Pete Grieg. It’s sitting in my shelf somewhere I think. Not because its not good, but because somewhere along the way while reading it, I found myself becoming the answer to my heartfelt prayers.

The first time I really experienced ‘becoming the answer to my prayers’ was during my first ministry posting. I was doing newsletters and setting up social media sites for the organisation I was working for.

I had never studied media nor did I take any course in journalism, but there was I, figuring out timings to post stuff on to Facebook and Instagram, as well as navigating the world of website building which was foreign to me.

I sighed to the Lord, why am I even doing this?

And then it came – the flashback to a moment in my childhood. I remembered that as a passionate Jesus loving tween, I prayed for the social media world (which was then called friendster and msn) to be a place where Jesus light would shine.

And it was as if this Great Big Guy up there was hinting to me that I actually asked for this. I had prayed earnestly for the media world to be reclaimed and now I get to be the answer to my prayer.

I eyerolled a little and then continued my work quietly.

I never complained at where God put me since. Not because it was easier to be the answer to my prayer after that, but because I realised soon after, that God didn’t have to use me – yet He chose me. He took my little prayer seriously and allowed me to fumble my way around till He made me the answer to His heart’s desire. He dared trust me.

I realised that, its actually a great big privilege to pray and then to be the answer to my prayer.

For me, going where my best prayers take me meant I had to plough through some mundane days, but also work through some hard places in my heart – where I faced tears and dare I say a modern form of persecution. It took me to times where I was misunderstood and cried buckets, but it also took me to where Jesus was working.

It took me to people and places His heart was beating for. And sometimes, when I see something in front of me that I prayed for years ago, I feel like pinching myself, because its like God’s word and truth is being worked out in reality.

So friend, if you were once a passionate teenager like me, don’t stop praying, even if it may seem that your best prayers are taking you through unlikely and unfamiliar and even undesired territory. Because this is what I have learnt, those places that your best prayers take you are the places on God’s heart, and being willing to pray yourself into and through those prayers means that you get to pray down the will of God. And more than changing history, you get changed, you realise how good God is, how wretched you are and a bit of Him starts to run off you.

You get to live out the second line of the Lord’s Prayer – ‘Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven.’ And you get to experience first-hand the first line of what Jesus said when the disciples asked Him to teach them to pray – ‘Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be your name.’ You get to know the Father in a way that only spending time with Him will get you. You get to know the Father in a way that only wrestling through the Bible will get you to.

And you will soon realise that those silly little prayers, and those crazy little steps of obedience, those silent questionings and wrestling through the word of God was what brought you closer and what brought His kingdom closer.

Pray. Then go where your best prayers take you. Unclench your fist and allow Abba Father to take you on an adventure of a lifetime. Don’t second guess His word. Wrestle the doubt, but don’t doubt Him and His truth.

I did that, and I have never regretted it since.

(P/S – The above art piece was commissioned for a brave soul who is going places and bringing relief to people who need it. I believe he is going where his best prayers are taking him, why don’t you try?)