The Prayer Room

The alarm clock went off at 1:15am Tuesday morning. I was sleeping in the living room so I wouldn't wake my wife up at that early hour. I dressed, put a english muffin in the toaster and ran a comb through my hair. As I headed out the door I thought about how most of the sane people in the world would be sleeping, but I was heading off to church. It was foggy so I had to drive slowly. That's a good thing, because I would have hit a raccoon and two deer if I had been driving my normal speed through the woods. I guess they were surprised that anyone was out at that hour.

I pulled into church and relieved the person in the prayer room. It was a familiar place, yet somehow at 2:00 in the morning it was different. There was something radical about being there. After pouring a cup of coffee, I spent a few minutes reading the prayer requests and the scribbles of the people who had been there before me.

I tried to pray, but I found it hard to focus. My mind kept wandering. Finally I asked God, "Lord, what am I doing here? Why am I here in the middle of the night? I could come here anytime and pray. Why 2 in the morning?"

It wasn't an audible voice, more of a sense in my spirit of what God wanted to say to me. It was only four words, yet it cut through all of my defenses right to the heart of the matter. "Do not be afraid." As I sorted through what I had been experiencing over the last days, it became clear that I was full of anxiety. Things are in flux here at church. We have programs starting up, there are a lot of people I'm trying to connect with, counseling I'm working on, a construction project starting as well as working on the sale of our current building which could upset all of our current ministry plans.

In the midst of that uncertainty the four words "Do not be afraid" pierced me. I sat down and remembered that those words are the most frequent command in the Bible. And why not? After all, we are called to walk by faith, not by sight. I thought about the many times God said "Do not be afraid" to people. There's no reason to fear if we recognize that God is with us.

I had to repent and confess to God that I hadn't been trusting him with the future. As I did, a tremendous peace filled me. Suddenly, I knew how to pray. I began to pray for the people I knew. I prayed that they would not be afraid. I prayed that they would be able to put their anxieties at the feet of Jesus, look into his face, and realize that He is in control. I prayed for people facing sickness, struggling with their marriages, their kids (or their parents), their jobs. I prayed for the missionaries God laid on my heart who are ministering in difficult places. I prayed for my family.

The doorbell rang. My two hours in the prayer room was over and it was time to head home. My fears were gone. I had experienced a touch from God and had spent time in intercession. I sang a praise song as I drove through the woods, "God is good, all the time..."