Teri

Yesterday was a day of the unexpected delays.   I wanted to be on the road by 10am.  God had other plans.  We had a wonderfully unexpected detour to eat and pray with a good friend, Glenn.  During that detour, we met new friend that I’m sure God intended to intersect with us this journey.

Well after noon, and about 20 miles down the road of our journey, Ashely realized one of the tires on her car had a puncture – a large one.  Our next delay sent us off to find a repair shop.

We found a little shop a couple miles from the interstate.  It looked like any other mechanic’s shop.  Two men with grease on their hands were busy fixing stuff.  We pulled up and explained our plight to the mechanic.  He said he would look at it and let us know.  A woman stood off to the side as she waited for her car to get finished.  She looked hot and tired.

We had long enough to strike up a conversation with her.  Her name is Barbi.  I asked her what her dream was.  She said, “My dreams have been trampled so many times, I don’t even want to dream anymore.”  I could tell that her heart longed to dream and it didn’t take much encouragement before she was talking about what she loves to do.

We prayed with her right there next to the stack of tires.

Our tire was fixed in about 20 minutes.  As we paid our $8.50 bill, we saw something in the eyes of the owner.  Sadness… longing… something.  God had given us eyes to see.

I asked him, “How can we pray for you?”  As you can imagine, he was a bit surprised.  But, then he told us that his daughter had recently moved to Texas and he misses her terribly.  We prayed for him and his daughter.

I’m not a great “pray-er”.  I often don’t know what words to say.  To be honest, I don’t even really like prayer that much.  But, I know that God DOES something when you pray.  A supernatural interaction happens  deep inside us when we pray together.  I saw the sad look in his eyes lighten and I saw a flash of peace across his face.

Emy said it best, “We all need to turn on our ‘pray-dar’ and be ready to pray whenever for whoever.”  Ashley chimed in, “That was $8.50 well spent!”  The prayers changed us too.

What would happen if we turned on their “pray-dar” each day.  How many people around us have longing in their eyes?  How many people are tired and worn-out?  How many people have had their dreams trampled?

What can a 60-second, heart-felt prayer do in the lives of those around us?   In us?