God Answers Prayers

One Million Saved Because One Man Decided to Pray on His Lunch Hour

I don't know who decides what music we listen to at work. I suppose it's the manager who opens the store in the morning. I've worked there for almost a month, and every day has played the same station. It's some kind of old music. It's mostly songs I don't know. I'm sure they were catchy in their time, but they're not something I could dance to. And after a month of the same songs on repeat I was getting tired.
And then I remembered I could ask someone to change it. I could bring it up with the store manager. I could complain to my coworkers. I could sneak into the manager's office and try to figure out how to change it on my own. I could bribe my friends to do it. I could talk to my direct manager. I could talk to the sales manager. I could talk to the courtesy clerks going by and see if they knew anything. Maybe they would know who to talk to about changing the music. I could ask the guys in the meat department. Guys in the meat department always seem to know everything about the store.
Or I could pray.
"King Jesus, I know this is kind of a silly request, but I'm really tired of this music. Could we please listen to something else tomorrow? I would prefer pop, but really I would listen to country if only we didn't have to listen to this anymore. In Jesus' Name."
The next day I walked into work. And what were they playing? Pop. And I couldn't stop smiling.

I made a very bad decision. I was in a lot of pain and at a low point, susceptible to spiritual attack. What could make me feel better?

A guy who did not love Jesus asked me on a date. I knew better. I said yes.

It was fun.
Mostly I felt guilty because I knew I shouldn’t be there and would have to tell him I couldn’t date him. He asked me on a second date. 

I said yes. 

I did not have what it took to say no. Like I said, I was in a lot of pain and was susceptible to spiritual attack.

I went home and cried on the bathroom floor.

“King Jesus, I don’t have what it takes to change. I don’t have what it takes to tell him no. I’m searching within myself for the courage, or wisdom, or strength, or whatever it is I’m lacking, and it just isn’t there. I need help.”

I went to sleep.

I woke up with peace. God gave me the power to tell him I would not date him because he was not serious about Jesus.

And even greater than the fact that God answered my prayer is the fact that he redeemed my failures and made this man think twice about what it meant to belong to Jesus. He started reading his Bible. He started going to church. He asked questions and looked for answers. Jesus used my failures to draw someone a little closer to himself.

I had a friend going through a very hard time. I wanted to be there for her. It was hard. It was exhausting. The darkness she walked through pulled me in. I didn’t want to do the work I knew Jesus was asking me to do. I wanted to stay home after work and watch a movie and forget about my troubles and everyone else’s. I fell flat on my face and prayed, “King Jesus, I need you to give me the strength to do your work.” And he filled me with the power to get up and love her, to leave my house and make sure she ate dinner. He took away my weariness in those moments and gave me rest.

It was over halfway through Elevate and things were bad. No one prepares you for the spiritual attack you will encounter in La Jolla. No one tells you how dark it will be. No one tells you of the oppression. And they assure you there will be all the people to help you. I was alone. I was attacked. I hated it. It was not worth it. I almost bought a plane ticket home. Why bother staying?

So I prayed.

“King Jesus, I can’t do this. I am going to leave you. I am going to turn around and never come back. I am going to leave you and leave the faith. I am out. I am leaving Elevate. I am leaving you. There is nothing here. You have nothing for me. I need you to change me, because I cannot change myself. My heart is firmly set and there is nothing that can change my mind. And I know this will kill me. Please save me.”

There was never a specific moment when he covered me with peace, but I stayed the last several weeks of Elevate. And I’m glad I did not leave when I had the chance.

I walked up the stairs of the WSU library. I was a freshman and things were hard. I was depressed. Looking back, I understand the feeling of depression to be a direct spiritual attack. It is a tactic the devil uses to get me down to a place I will listen to his lies. And then he spreads his work through me.

I walked up the stairs and prayed, “Please don’t leave me here. Please don’t leave me here alone.”

And God provided a friend who walked with me the next two years. She is the only person I feel has truly discipled me. She is the only one who made me a priority and carried through even though I cried every week and didn’t know what I was looking for.

We met for prayer weekly. One of the guys loves to pray healing for everyone who has any kind of ailment. He’s a little weird in that way, and I respect him for his weirdness. Our friend came in with a sore back. He'd had a long day at work. We prayed for our cities and for the usual things and then we were done.

“Does your back still hurt?” Healing-boy said.

“Yes,” Said sore-back-boy.

“Can I pray for it?”

There were five of us present. There was no one to impress. There was nothing to sell.

“Sure, man.”

So Healing-boy sat there and prayed power over sore-back-boy’s back.

“How does it feel?” He asked when he was done.

Sore-back-boy twisted. “It feels better. It hurts a little, but it’s better. Thanks man.”

That wasn’t good enough for Healing boy, so he prayed again.

Sore-back-boy twisted. He stood up and twisted some more. He bent over. He threw his hands up. “It doesn’t even hurt anymore!”

A friend of mine broke his foot in a motorcycle crash. His foot has healed but is not whole. We sat around one day after Bible study and a friend asked if he could pray for the broken foot.

The four of us huddled around broken-foot-boy and prayed power over him one by one. Our hands were on his foot. As we prayed, we felt the ligaments moving. We felt the bones correcting. We felt the brokenness healing.

Since I was five, I’ve had dreams of running and not being able to escape. A few months ago I started having a lot of dreams with demons in them. They were beautiful dreams where demons tried to attack me in some way or another, but Jesus always won.

I dreamed someone was chasing me and I tried and tried to get away, but he was always one step ahead of me. After many twistings and turnings and many near escapes I gave up. I turned toward my pursuer and fell flat on my face. I prayed. I asked God to come rescue me.

The pursuer freaked out and rushed over to me, trying to pick me up, trying to stop me from crying out to Jesus. He knew that as soon as I called to Jesus, he no longer had a chance.

I told a friend and she freaked out, saying demons were having dominion over my sleep and my dreams. She insisted upon praying for me. She insisted upon recruiting another prayer warrior to pray for me. Prayer-warrior invited me to her house and she and her husband prayed for me.

A little while later I had a dream where I was in some kind of slave work camp. Through the events of the dream, I was kicked out of the camp and the doors were locked behind me. I wandered through the forest, but no one chased me.

While I was at Elevate I sent a text to Healing-boy. “Do I have authority to pray for healing in Jesus’ name? I know the answer, but I just want to hear someone say it.”

His reply was as long as a book. I read it over and over.
My friend had a sore knee.

“Can I pray for it?”

She said it felt better, but she didn’t believe God had healed her.

Some days later she had a headache.

“Can I pray for it?”

She allowed me, and the headache was gone when I’d finished. She told me while I was praying, the headache came and went. It left as soon as I started praying, and then she doubted and it came back. Then I kept praying and it left. And then it stayed away for good. God healed her even when she didn’t believe he would.

I had a roommate from Sweden. She was here on an international exchange program. Before she left Sweden she prayed she wouldn’t have to search for a church but could join one immediately. God used me to provide the answer. She came to church with me as long as she was in the US.

My friend and I started running together and praying while we ran. We prayed for President Trump, that he would turn to Jesus and make good choices for our country and be bombarded with the love of God and other things. That very same night, the nation was blown away because he was a little bit respectful in his speech.

Every time I ask the prayer team to pray for boldness and opportunity to share the gospel with my coworkers I have spiritual conversations at work. When I don’t, I don’t.

I didn’t know what it meant to forgive, so I asked God, “God, what does it mean to forgive?” A few days later a man on the radio talked about what it means to forgive.

I was staying late one day in high school to work on a school project. My teacher got a phone call. There was a family emergency. His wife was pregnant. I prayed. The girl is healthy, and by now is surely killing it in elementary school. 

My math professor had an unexpected health problem, and the Holy Spirit descended upon me to pray urgently. I prayed urgently though I didn’t know what had happened. I later learned my professor had a rare breakage in his intestines, one which kills a man within 24 hours. Miraculously, he was not killed.

A guy went snowboarding and broke his ribs. He was in a lot of pain. He told us he was laying in bed and prayed for healing. His ribs started feeling better and he freaked out and stopped praying. I laughed. That’s what I would have done.

Healing-boy, sore-back-boy, and another boy insisted on praying for him. Broken-ribs-boy was hesitant. They prayed. He later told the story. While they were praying he got really hot. His ribs crackled inside. The pain left completely. While they were praying, one of the guys praying for him said his leg was no longer sore. Healing-boy called this collateral healing.