Skip to main content

31 Days: Listen



Since January 1, I have tried to sit on the edge of my bed every morning to say a prayer for the day. I ask God to watch over my parents, to let my sister have a good day at school, and I pray for family and friends going through a difficult time. I say these prayers in a hurry, practically as I head at the door. But I never stop to listen.

I hear God in His actions. In the narrow misses of being hit by someone running a red light. In the overtime money that comes just as I need to put new tires on my car. In the Sunday afternoons spent with my parents, with my Daddy telling us stories of his youth.

When I first thought about writing this post, I thought of this photo, taken in a church in Rome.


But as I looked at it, it seemed as the person praying was stopped mid-sentence, perhaps taking a breath before he started petitioning God for the next thing on his list. He could be praying for his family and friends but he appeared to be doing all the talking.

I want to be more like the woman, sitting quietly, thinking about what God has done for her and waiting to hear what she can do for God. I want to listen to Him for a change instead of asking Him to listen to me. I want to hear what He has to say.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Five Minute Friday: Roots

Lisa-Jo Baker (lisajobaker.com) hosts a weekly event on her blog called "Five Minute Friday". The rules are 1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.. So here's my first try at this. Today's topic was Roots. Roots – I think about my grandparents who lived on a farm until my grandfather’s diabetes worsened and they moved to a town with a hospital nearby. My father still says he wished he could have kept that farm. I think of my grandmother who was a widow for 20 years. Every year she would stand over my PaPa’s grave, wishing she was with him. I think of my parents, a product of those grandparents, how hard my father worked to put 2 girls through...

Five Minute Friday: Time

Five Minute Friday is a writing event that has writers spending five minutes writing on the same topic and then sharing them at http://katemotaung.com/five-minute-friday/ . This week's word is Time. Sometimes time feels like this, like we are in it. Standing inside it, watching life pass by. It is so easy to get stuck in a time - in our pain, in our hurt. We hear the ache tick away in our head like a giant clock. Time, instead, is a gift. More time with family, more time to accomplish goals, more time to see the world. When you are hurting, it seems like time takes forever. One day turns into another day, turns into another day. When we hate a job, the five days of time that make up a work week seem to go on forever. But those five days are also a gift. Because these days, a job is not a guarantee. I want to see time as gift, not as a chore. I want to be on the other side of it, wishing there was more of it. Making the most of every hour, minute, and second instead of...

Five Minute Friday: Brave

Right now at this point in my life, it feels like the bravest thing I should be doing is trusting God's plan for me. It is so scary to hand everything over to Him and trust that it will all be alright. Or maybe what I should test my bravery on is trusting His timing.  I do trust that He has a good plan for me, I just wish He'd hurry up and reveal it to me. It's been six long years of waiting to see what good will come from my divorce. Six years of feeling broken, worthless, and unlovable. I believe with my whole heart that He will make good from what was meant to harm me, He will give me double for my trouble, but I want my beauty for ashes RIGHT NOW! I also need to find the bravery to believe the good things people tell me about me. This has been a really hard week for me and through their words and their shows of concerns, I know that people care about me but I can't find the courage to turn that into self-love. When I look in the mirror, I still see ug...