I Believe in the Power of Prayer

Please pray for this family.

http://jamescamdensikes.blogspot.com/

I have read and reread and reread these posts. I have projected myself in the story and tried, if even for a minute, to wrap my brain around the anguish that this sweet family has endured. And just as I get near the thought of it - the knot in my throat and the stinging in my eyes is so profound - I have to shake the notion loose and slip back into the warm comfort of my currently uneventful and thus beautiful life. For my uneventful, beautiful life, I am truly grateful. This story makes me feel guilty - guilty that I take comfort in the fact that it is not me. Guilty that the statistic is still a story I am reading, someone else's life far from my reality. But the fact is, it is someone's life - someone's reality - a couple just like Billy and I, who can't, for even one minute, allow ourselves to imagine our lives with out our sweet precious children in it. To be living it must be unbearable, and for that I am truly sorry.

I, for one, believe in the power of prayer. I didn't used to - partly because I didn't understand it and partly because I had never seen it in action. I also didn't used to believe in the importance and power of social media - but as I see the connections of the Sikes family with strangers, who embrace them and love them, growing exponentially - I can see clearly, now, the value.

I always struggled with the idea of prayer being effective. Would a benevolent and loving God truly decide an outcome based on whether or not there were people praying? Could the number of people in a prayer group and the degree of intensity of the prayer truly impact what happens? If God is sovereign, how would the free will of our prayers affect an outcome? It never made sense to me to think that perhaps God would not spare a child's life or comfort a widow if there was no prayer group to support them. If I were ill and dying and had no one praying for me, would God overlook me? Would my suffering be greater for the lack of network? Did it really come down to popularity or works on my part? But I think, I was missing the point.

Someone once shared an analogy about prayer with me, and suddenly it made perfect sense. If a father holds up an apple and asks his son what color it is - he just wants to hear that it is red. Whether the child answers or not, how quickly he answers, or if he answers correctly matters not and changes nothing about the apple - the father just wants to hear his little one say it. I believe that the Plan is in place - God knows what color the apple is, but He cherishes the sound of his people lifting each other up. And at the same time, the power of positve energy is an amazing thing and to know, as a person, that others, especially stangers, are taking the time to support and love you and plead to God on your behalf, is as beautiful as it is comforting and speaks to the inherent greatness of man.

Nothing we say will comfort this family - but I hope that later when they read through the volumes of comments that people have left and the blogs (like this one) that were dedicated to them, they will feel loved, both by their brothers and sisters on Earth and their Father in heaven.

To the Sikes family - we are all on our knees for you - pleading on your behalf. Prayers for comfort and strength are being sent up. May God bless you and your sweet family.