reinbeck umc - the view out my window

Hard Prayers

How do we pray when God's will seems so strange to us?

I have been struggling with a situation many of you know about.  Just a few weeks ago the lady was so vital, and alive, and hopeful.  Just a few weeks ago she was praying for others.  Now she lies in a hospice bed, comfortable but unresponsive; and each day seems to bring her closer to meeting Jesus face to face.

I have been reading scripture to her.  I have been visiting the family often. I pray each time I am with them, but each time I have to ask myself, "what am I supposed to be praying here?"  I want her to stand up and say "Fooled you, didn't I."  And I fully believe God could make that happen!!   But I feel like I am between a rock and a hospital bed.  She has suffered for a long time.  Her body must be tired from battling the arthritis that has hurt her for so long. Should I be praying for something different:  mercy? comfort?  wholeness? release from this body?

Oh, this is not the first time I have faced this question.  It seems to arise with disturbing regularity as we pray our way through life.  Even Jesus faced the question with respect to his own death.  "Father if it be thy will let this cup pass from me."  If it be thy will?  Apparently Jesus himself didn't know what to pray at that moment.  Quite understandably, his own desire was to NOT face the cross.  He must have also known that walking away may not be God's will.   He prayed for what he wanted but qualified it with "If it be thy will."   Apparently this works, but I find it wholly unsatisfying.  It seems like Jesus was just covering his tail.

Is that the best we can do?  I'm sorry but that sounds like any one of the politicians we have had crawling around the state for the last year.  If you listen closely to their promises they always leave themselves an out . . .  just in case.

I think I am coming upon an answer . . .  maybe we can just throw ourselves on the mercy of the one who has the answers.  Rather than thinking of prayer as requesting, perhaps we need to look at prayer as pouring ourselves out before God.  Pouring myself out in this case would mean telling God how much it hurts to have someone so lively and inspiring suddenly and surprisingly confined to bed.  It might mean telling God how much we miss her.  How much her family misses her, even as they sit at her bedside?  Maybe it is pouring out our surprise that this has happened so quickly.  Perhaps it even means pouring out our desire to have her miraculously returned to the Wednesday morning mission group.  Perhaps it means pouring out (in all honesty) our confusion about what we should pray. 

God is going to do what is best whether we agree with it or not.  Maybe we need to reframe our prayers in situations like this.  I thought I was past the youthful idea of the vending machine God, but apparently that is not entirely true.  How about exchanging a vending machine for a shoulder to cry on?  That sounds like a good idea to me. A soft shoulder sounds like a good idea right now anyway.

Can God be your shoulder to cry on?  Does that make sense to you?