Seeing Through the Glass Darkly or Prayer Changes Things/Us

This is not just any old chair...

Many, a many a prayer has climbed faith's stair from this old chair!

Prayers for forgiveness, wisdom, healing, patience and trust

and above all, love.

Prayer changes things; it transcends logic’s altitude of facts 

And transfers answers onus to He who His will exacts 

Mercy makes no mistakes, though the middle of His reply 

May feel like harsh rebuttals to the creature of the cry 

Prayer changes things; even when reasoning is mystified 

And ‘answers’ do not always feel like God is on our side 

Prayer changes things, if faith can learn to trust enough to yield 

And leave it all to Love until His purpose is revealed 

Prayer changes things; it flees the cage of comprehension’s scope 

And leaves the outcome with the One who is man’s Living Hope 

Prayer teaches us to listen as He whispers ‘Peace, be still’ 

While He works out for Greater Good the purpose of His will 

Prayer changes things, like attitudes impaired with fear or pride 

The Potter shapes the clay where change begins; on the inside 

And just as Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane 

Prayed to his Father so He bids us all ‘come unto Me’ 

Prayer changes things; as we begin to relinquish control 

And surrender the answers to the Saviour of the soul 

Prayer is the hiding place beneath the feathers of His wings 

Where God gathers us close, so close to Him; prayer changes things 

© Janet Martin 

We pray yet often prayers feel unanswered. 

We pray for healing and people die. 

We pray for the salvation of lost souls, ‘but they will not’ 

We pray for change that does not happen 

For love that seems to fail. 

But we see through a glass darkly. We see in part. 

Jesus prayed in Gethsemane and taught us how to pray;

Matt.26:39 

Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, 

"My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. 

Yet not as I will, but as you will." 

He was brutally crucified. He died. 

It looked like His prayer was unanswered but

God the Father sees beyond the present circumstance/suffering! 

Isa. 53:10-11

Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
    and though the Lord makes[c] his life an offering for sin,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
    and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.

After he has suffered,
    he will see the light of life[d] and be satisfied[e];
by his knowledge[f] my righteous servant will justify many,
    and he will bear their iniquities.

Heb 2. 8-10 

Now in putting everything in subjection to him, 

he left nothing outside his control.

At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him. 

But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, 

crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, 

so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. 

For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, 

in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation

perfect through suffering...

How Deep The Father's Love For Us