I Sold My Piano

Prayer is a funny thing. God is a funny thing, or being I guess. Whatever. I remember the good ol days of 722, I mean way back in the beginnings, and we discussed prayer, its effectiveness (or lack thereof). It was actually a night where people took different sides. If, as some did and do, someone believed in man’s complete lack of free will his or her view of prayer seemed to be diminished quite a bit. If God know everything that will happen, and man’s path is paved without choices, then why pray? It’s sorta useless. And some people who are 5-point Calvinists can try to argue their way around it but I haven’t heard anything too dreadfully convincing. The interplay between God’s sovereignty and our free will is something we certainly can’t wrap our minds around, and that might seem like a cop-out answer to some of you but I don’t really care what you think.

 

Having said this, if you’ve read my last few posts you’ve discovered I’m having trouble finding like-mindedness. People who think and breath like me—with the same passions and such. So I prayed a lot. About this. And while I was praying the thought occurred to me, Prayer, funny thing, is this helping? So with that thought in mind I perused the Bible. (Yes, I was questioning the practical effectiveness of prayer, though I have never really struggled with the value of prayer. If Jesus prayed to Daddy, it must be important.) But, as I was perusing, I stumbled upon a verse in James, a passage really, about prayer. And the funny thing is it’s one I’ve read quite a bit. It’s marked red with ink in my Bible. So I read it again, and God slapped me with revelation (like a jealous lover her boyfriend as he checks out a girl in a green dress not too far off):

 

“Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months.” –James 5:17

 

Are you kidding me? Why had nobody ever shown me that verse? It seems like this is one of those things that puts out an argument faster than a fire brigade can put out a candle. The sentence before answers the question, “Does prayer really do anything?”

 

“The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.” –James 5:16b

 

Hello? Is anyone hearing this? Pray you dummies. It seems obvious that prayer is something not only valuable to God, but something effective in mankind’s efforts against the Evil One. Golly, it’s like someone was hiding that from me or something. I wish I could go yell it out.

 

But anyway, I prayed to God that He would give me people I love to be around. And, ideally, people who I love to be around and who love Jesus, too. So the past couple of days I have met some really cool people. Some who are Christians, some who aren’t, some who I’d like to get to know better and might not get the chance to, and some who I will get to know better as the year rolls by. Here are a few:

 

Vauhini is really great. She is from Seattle and went to Stanford. So, as you can already guess, she is brilliant. She is in the fiction department in the Writer’s Workshop and writes really well. Characters are people you know or at least can believe. Vauhini isn’t Christian but has been really respectful of my faith and has asked a lot of questions. Jesus would love to have Vauhini follow Him. She would do wonders for His name. Vauhini, after she went to Stanford, spent four years working as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal in San Francisco. Not only is she terribly brilliant, but she is great with people, too. She has a soft and gracious heart that is the kind of heart the Church needs.

 

There is also Josh, and since there is already a Josh the Quarterback I will call this one Josh the Playwright. Josh the Playwright wrote a book, non-fiction, that is just great. I will probably blog about it later in the week if I think about it. But here’s what it is: think Donald Miller meets St. Paul meets the “War on Terror” (Yes, that bloody mess). It is awesome. If you want to read it ask me about it. But anyway, I am getting coffee with Josh on Wednesday and I am really excited about it because he loves Jesus and he doesn’t like the fragmented nature of our political system. He is a really honest guy in his book, like Adam Duritz in his lyrics, and I connected with his words a great deal. In fact, it has probably been the closest book to my heart in the past few months. Read it! If you want to know the title, ask me! Hopefully me and Josh the Playwright connect well.

 

Andrew the Poet is the last one I will blog about I think. Hopefully me and Andrew can hang out soon, because he is really great, and we have a few automatic connections: he is from Alabama, which means he is awesome already because even though Texas is different from ‘Bama, it’s still a South thang. Also, something which I learned today, Andrew the Poet is a Christian, which is rare in Iowa City and even rarer for a student in the Iowa Workshop. I walked into the coffee shop today and he was reading Job. That’s cool.

 

So, that is what prayer did. It brought these (and a few more) people close to me and hopefully closer in the future, so you can pray for that. Also, pray for Vauhini, Andrew, and Josh, that they would either come to know the Lord (in Vauhini’s case) or that they would continue in their integrity and faith (in Josh’s case and Andrew’s case). I will even give u a checklist:

 

1.     1) Pray for Vauhini, that she would continue to ask great questions and, Lord willing, come to know Christ. (Because I can feel how much Christ loves her it wrenches at my ventricles.)

2.     2) Pray for Josh the Playwright, that God would comfort him and give him peace and fellowship.

3.     3)Pray for Andrew the Poet, that God would encourage him and allow him to find a church that will nourish his Southern spirit.

4.     4) Pray for me, that God would bring one of these people (or more, obviously) close to me so I can have true, beautiful fellowship with other believers.

5.     5) If you want to read Josh the Playwright’s amazing book, ask me.