#Snakes,ScorpionsAndStones

The bedroom was tight with furniture. A treadle sewing machine was placed between two double beds and there was a dresser and a wardrobe and a chair. My sister and I slept in one double bed and my grandmother and youngest sister slept in the other double bed. On the wall next to the mirror over the dresser was a little plaque which I read every day - "Prayer Changes Things". I remember saying to myself as a young girl, that prayer changes people.

The disciples saw that Jesus frequently got alone to pray and they became curious and asked Him how one ought to pray. That is when He gave them what we now call the Lord's Prayer, but He didn't stop there. He went on to explain more. He instructed them to even bother the provider with their requests and be persistent till the answer came. He told them to knock and keep on knocking and seek and keep on seeking and to ask and keep on asking. Prayer, evidently, requires a deep seated need in order for one to be that demanding.

But, that was not all He told them. Jesus shared that a good loving father will not give a stone when a request for a loaf of bread is presented or give a serpent when a fish is requested or a scorpion when an egg is asked for. He went to rather extreme measures depicting the answers to prayers, not benign, but even dangerous which makes me wonder why. One possibility could be why Jesus illustrated answers to our prayers with such descriptions is that sometimes what we get is not what we expected our loving Father God to give. It just might seem harmful or negative and we might jump to the conclusion that God doesn't love us or that He is incapable.

God did warn us when He said that His ways are not our ways and His thoughts are higher than ours, so we misunderstand much. His ways are always good, tho they may seem not to be so and we can see a serpent instead of a fish if we look at it naturally. It takes faith to believe in God's character and to know that He only does what is good. We have to make ourselves see with the eyes of faith and trust God's perfect goodness when it comes to getting the unexpected and wait on Him to make clear the reason for the unexpected. Prayer does change things and it does change people, too.

Keep on praying for it is not altogether about getting the answers for our needs, it is much about getting to know the God of the Bible and developing an intimate relationship with Him.