The Power of Prayer

Sometimes in my lack of faith, I wonder if God is listening to my prayers. There are seemingly unselfish things that I have prayed for many decades like the salvation of family and friends or the relief of chronic pain for others that have not gone the way that I want them to. While in my head, I know that God is sovereign and He will answer my prayers how and when He wants to, my heart sometimes doubts. In recent months I have seen God answer two very specific prayers in ways that can not be explained by human rationale, ensuring that He gets all of the glory and strengthening my faith in prayer. I would like to share one of those with you.

A dear, elderly, family friend with Down’s syndrome recently went missing after dark in downtown Brantford. He never leaves his home without someone being with him, and he does not know the area or even how to cross the street safely by himself. Due to his age and several physical challenges, he is not able to walk very long and gets sore and tired easily so no one thought that he could have gotten more than a few blocks away. There was much concern for his safety because he would not know how to look after himself on the streets and probably would not be able to ask for help because his speech is very difficult to understand. The police were notified, and many people began searching.

Upon finding out about the situation, my first thought, as usual, was to jump into action. I got in my car with one of my daughters and we started searching the area near his home. We drove around checking the streets, dark driveways, railway tracks and even behind the bushes in the downtown parks. I never thought that I would find myself getting out of my car in downtown Brantford after dark talking to strangers, but we did everything that we could to try to find him including praying while we were looking. My wife stayed at home praying and asking many other people to pray for his safety. About an hour into the search my wife called us and said that she wanted to come to help us search, to which my daughter replied, “Mom, the best thing you can do right now is keep praying”. She was right, often the best action we can take is to drop to our knees.

About two hours after leaving his home, the missing friend walked safely into Brantford General Hospital by himself and when the nurse asked him how he got there he replied, “I just followed the light”. He repeated that answer to his family the next day. Now please understand that under normal circumstances this friend would not have been able to walk up the hill to the hospital on his own, and he certainly could not have walked the minimum 2 kms to get there. There was no doubt in our minds that God provided a miracle.

While many of us jumped into action and did practical things to find our friend, (something that was not wrong and I would do again), the solution came through prayer alone. God could have led us to find our friend but then we would have received the credit and the usefulness of our prayers could have been questionable. However, God in His infinite sovereignty and wisdom, solved the situation in way that only He could receive the glory and He reminded us about the power of prayer.

** The author of this devotional wishes to remain anonymous.