So yesterday I was reading my Bible, and I came to this verse in Psalm that really got
me thinking, and it really just kind of stuck to my heart.
It's in Psalm 102 and it's verse 17.
It says, He will respond, He, God, will respond to the prayer of the destitute.
And this verse, it got me thinking about a lot of the things that have been happening
around our world.
It got me thinking about typhoons in the Philippines, and it got me thinking about tornados in central
Illinois, and it got me thinking about people who, in a matter of hours, lost everything,
lost their homes, some lost their families, lost their jobs, lost their towns, lost their
possessions, and they find themselves completely destitute.
And even beyond that, it got me thinking about the millions of people around the world for
whom their poverty is not a result of natural disasters, but it's a reality that they're
forced to live with each and every day.
Every day they try and find food.
Every day they try and find clean drinking water.
They are homeless all the time.
And even beyond that, it got me thinking about those who are spiritually destitute, those
who, in the last year, have lost a family member, or who have lost their job, or have
gone through a divorce, or sickness has completely overtaken their family, and they're just left
confused or angry or wondering where they're supposed to go next.
And I can't help but think about the prayers of those who are physically or spiritually
destitute and how their prayers must outnumber my own by thousands, because we all know that
it's only when we have nothing that we finally begin to realize how much God is truly everything.
And in light of all of those prayers that are prayed by those who are destitute, I think
this verse provides a lot of much needed hope because the verse says He, God, will respond
to those prayers.
See, God doesn't just hear those prayers.
He responds.
He moves.
He acts.
He answers those prayers.
And now I know that there's more than one person out there who is saying, "No no no,
Jon, you don't understand, I've been praying.
I've been praying that my son would finally come home.
I've been praying that someone would come and help us rebuild our house.
I've been praying and praying that I would get a job.
I've been praying and praying and praying, and God is not responding."
See, I believe that God has many, many ways for how He likes to respond to prayer, but
I think the most important, and the most necessary, and also the most underutilized is me and
you, the Church, His followers, men and women who are fully consecrated to performing His
purposes here on earth.
I believe that we are God's Plan A for answering and responding to the prayers of the destitute.
I like to think of prayer in terms of a triangle where a request is given up to God, who in
turn turns it into a calling which is given to someone as inspiration, someone who has
the ability to answer the request.
So perhaps it's not that God isn't responding to those prayers; perhaps it's that we are
not responding to God's call to answer them.
See, we as Christians love to get on our knees and ask God for the desires of our hearts,
and don't get me wrong, I believe that God loves that.
He loves when we tlak to Him, and He loves when we ask Him for things, especially when
those things align with His will.
But if we're all just sitting around asking God to answer our prayers, it's like we're
missing two halves of a triangle.
You see, the question is not, "Who's going to answer my prayer?"
The question is, "Whose prayer is God going to use me to answer?"
Let me say that again 'cause that's really good.
The question is not, "Who's going to answer my prayer?"
The question is, "Whose prayer is God going to use me to answer?"
The calling that's on your heart, the calling that God has placed on your heart, that's
God calling you to be the light in someone else's darkness, to be the hope in someone's
hopelessness, to be the comfort in their despair, to be the spark in their revolution, to be
the joy in their sadness.
That's God calling you to be the answer to somebody's prayers.
No, the question, the question is not, "Will God respond to the call of the destitute?"
No, the question is, "Will you?"