Promise through Powerful Prayer

I was planning to write a blog about the power of powerful prayer. It really is powerful. Well while I was brainstorming and putting my thoughts in order, I thought I would Google the word prayers and grab an inspirational image or two. Most of the pictures were really really cheesy images of some sparkly Precious Moments character and a sappy poem in old lady font. You know what I am talking about the ones your grandma sends you as a forward….. (Hi Grandma, I love your forwards by the way!)


Well I clicked on the first image that wasn’t cheesy partly because it wasn’t sappy and partly because I wanted to get a better look at the picture. Below is the image that popped up. I'll explain what it is in a moment.

This may not mean very much to any of you but it took my breath away. I was going to get on here and talk about how during a very powerful prayer session God spoke to me through scripture about what he wants in my future. Almost everything I have been anxious about lately was address and answered in this passage and it brought great hope for me. I was talking with my Good friend Cara.

This is an older pic of Cara and me. We have lots of fun girly times together doing silly things most adults don’t let themselves do anymore like; dance like a ballerina and pretend a red tablecloth is a queen’s robe or a set of wings while singing out loud to a pop song. Basically Cara brings out the best in me, she is also very wise and has discernment that I long to have one day.

Anyway we were talking and I was excitingly telling her about what the Lord had shown me. She too got excited that my prayers were so quickly and powerfully answered. But I confessed to her I was a little sad that the one anxiety God had not addressed was my anxiety about my love for the nations. That is where that picture I Googled comes back into play. It is a picture of prayer boards hanging in a temple in Kamakura, Kanagawa Japan. During exam time in Japan student flock to temples and buy prayer board for high marks.

Once I clicked on this image it opened a new tab that showed it was from a website called Global compassion. The web site is 100% secular; a place for people to connect and share images from all over the world. What is most spectacular is that the specific page it took me to was called Japan Window, Glimpses of Japan. (click on the words it’s a link)

In case you don’t know very much about me the Lord has used Japan in my life, for the past 8 and years. It was there that I encountered him for the first time and started a personal relationship with him. It was Japan that God used to ignite in me a desire to spread his name among the broken hearted. That particular web page was talking about spirituality in Japan, and how for the most part they claim no connection or belief in God even in the gods and idols they worship. They do these acts as a ritual, a natural reaction to the fear of a god or in strong desire for something more, but in reality they have no hope of an actual connection with a living God.

It was just amazing to me that as I was going to talk about this grand experience during prayer, I had a secret underlying anxiety about my future involvement in loving the nations, God called out that anxiety and almost as a promise showed me the ever present need for compassion towards the world, that has always been represented in my life as Japan. Sigh…. Thanks God.