“Soft Hearts”

Twice a month we join with other couples in praying for our adult children. Our group is called “Soft Hearts.” Some of these young adults on our long prayer list profess to know Christ, but most are not walking with Him. We have been praying for many years without seeing huge results.

Discouragement doesn’t come as easily as it used to, probably because God is refining our motives as we pray. We’ve learned much about ourselves and about prayer. We know that we cannot tell God what to do, and we realize that we approach Him on the basis of who He is and what Christ has done, not for any other reason.

This morning I read about the Lord and two angels dropping by Abraham’s tent for a visit (Genesis 18). While they talked, they decided to let Abraham in on what they were going to do. Because “the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave” these cities and the people in them were about to be destroyed. But Abraham’s nephew, Lot lived in Sodom.

Abraham began to speak to the Lord about this impeding judgment. He used words like, “Far be it from You to do such a thing as this, to slay the righteous with the wicked” and “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” and “I who am but dust and ashes have taken it upon myself to speak to the Lord” and “Let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak. . . .”

Abraham had no assumptions that God should do whatever he asked. His approach was tentative and deeply respectful. Nevertheless, he did intercede for Lot.

Later, “It came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when He overthrew the cities in which Lot had dwelt” (Genesis 19:29).

This verse encourages me. I’m not sure about the spiritual state of some of these young adults for whom we intercede, but God hears our prayers and He is able to rescue them from the judgment to come. (This is that eternal judgment that everyone deserves, and the only escape is faith in Jesus Christ, the kind of faith that results in obedience!)

This verse also reminds me of one in James 5. It says, “The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.” The context is healing and the necessity of confessing our sins before we ask God for anything. Righteous people are those with an open connection to God that is unclouded by unforgiven sin.

Lest I fear this means I must be super-spiritual, the next verses say, “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 land for three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.”

Elijah was not ordinary in some ways, but he was a human being like me. His story reveals that he had fears, doubts, and times of despair when he felt as if God was not listening. That happens to me and the others in “Soft Hearts.” Yet in obedience, Elijah prayed energetically and passionately. He trusted God even when God was silent. We want to be like Elijah and trust God as we pray, no matter what happens.

Abraham and Elijah both saw the answers to their prayers. We who pray for our children would like that, but we realize we could depart for glory before God produces visible results in the lives of our children. Ten years ago the idea of not seeing answers was a horrible thought, but after praying daily for this group of young men and women, we are more content. It is now easier to say that no matter what God does (or does not) do, and no matter when, He is the Judge of all the earth and He will do what is right.