The past few weeks we have had several days of house visits which has been so far on the race a sweet way to connect to the community and hear about their lives, followed by praying for them. When you don’t have a translator however things change. So all we can really do is smile, shake hands maybe a hug, speak the bit of Spanish we can, and pray. Pray for people that you don’t know, and for their lives you know nothing about. We have to trust the Spanish speakers are presenting the amazing hope of the gospel correctly, then our part is to pray. It can easily feel like we aren’t actually doing anything during these house visits. So we are presented with one question: how much do we really believe in the power of prayer?

Prayer is a tricky thing. Like from an outside perspective it’s probably wack. Are we just talking to ourselves all the time like a crazy person or is God listening? Is He a God who really cares??

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What’s up everybody?! I have made it close to the end of my time here in Honduras. We are on the coast for a week to debrief, but only half of our squad has actually made it so far due to COVID complications. So leaving the country may need to be postponed if we don’t all get healthy quickkk. But soon enough we will be on our way to the next country! 

And to help reveal the next country I wanted to make it fun and give you an opportunity to guess where I am going next!! So in the comments below leave the country you are guessing and your Venmo for me to send 5 dollars to you towards your next coffee or whatever if you guess correctly! Your only hint is that we will be landing in New Jersey for a connecting flight. 

Now back to the blog.

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It’s been clear to me throughout Honduras that He does. He doesn’t just care about our wants. He isn’t just a genie waiting to grant you wishes. He also cares about your heart, your feelings, your choices, and well all of it. He wants you. During my time in Honduras I have gotten a lot more real in prayers. I don’t want to just say the correct thing to Him all the time. Say the Lord’s Prayer and move on. No, I want my relationship with my Father to be real and vulnerable. I want Him to walk me through hard things. I want to be real when I don’t understand things. I want to be real when I am angry at Him. I want to be real with how in awe of Him I am. This is a relationship and it’s time we pray like it. 

But does He even hear our prayers for it to matter? Well in short yes. It at times can take a lot of faith to believe that but yes. Have you ever reflected on a couple days where one you start off your day praying and being thankful and just spending time with the Father to a day where you were maybe too busy and didn’t take that time? Maybe it’s hard to see a difference but for me it’s very clear. It’s easy for me to see how I am far more patient and loving on days where I start the day with my Father. Where other days I am more irritable. Maybe you have a different example, but that is my simple example that comes to mind where praying clearly makes a difference in my life. 

It has also been clear in situations. When I am letting God in on something and taking ideas or feelings to God to see if they are of Him or worth acting on, the result is far better. If I act out of my own mind it can be a totally different story. Even doing things that are meant to be for God or the glorification of the kingdom can easily back fire when it is not of God. Taking the time to pray changes everything and will bring a lot more wisdom to you.

Like week one of Honduras I was reading through King Solomons life. Although his life ended up being a disaster, early in his life he was after Gods heart like his father was. He desired wisdom more than anything and by asking God for wisdom he received it. Ask God for wisdom shoot daily but especially when making decisions. God does hear your prayer and wants to guide you. He desires your heart and your life.

With these house visits we chose to believe our prayers were going to impact these peoples lives. A few days we had the opportunity to bring beds to families. The first family I visited with a bed, the mother immediately was bawling. She went on to say she had been praying for a long time for a bed after a recent hurricane made life a lot harder. I get to see her prayers answered, but I didn’t get to see the months and months of prayer and whether that was always an easy thing which I am sure it wasn’t. Sometimes we don’t see prayers answered right away and write it off. But maybe God plans on answering that prayer. It isn’t always in our timeline or even always how we expect it to be answered, but God does answer prayers. Prayer is legit. God is legit.

Alright everybody. Make sure you drop your guesses in the comments. Make sure you go up in the blog to read what else to put in there along with a hint that won’t narrow it down much but helps a little. 

Love you all a lot! Jesus loves you a heck of a lot more!!

Peace,

Johnny D.