Reflection for the Week - October 22

The aim of the Christian life is not to spend enormous amounts of time and energy trying to figure out how and when God answers prayer, especially “for me,” but to love God, follow in the footsteps of Christ, love others, and to be and do this in the power of the Spirit. It seems likely that God responds to prayer in accordance with his Kingdom purposes – not offering parking places closer to the mall or providing special effects in the sky on an afternoon walk, especially “for me.” God, in my modest estimation, is not doing everything in micro-managing the world on my behalf, nor is God on stand-by doing nothing at all in response to prayer. If that’s the case, the line of Divine action is not fixed, but is a moving dynamic that has the capacity bring about God’s purposes through the very guts of the material world that God has caused to exist in the first place. How and when that happens, it seems, will remain a mystery that goes beyond human representation.