Joan Hershberger's Posts

Brief prayer

Posted by Joan Hershberger on April 19, 2011 at 6:23

While I struggle to pray as much as I intend to pray for family, I was reminded recently, that God hears any and all of our prayers. I have prayed the briefest of prayers for the company sales staff. "Lord be with ..... " naming each "today as they go about their job." Sometimes I add more, but mostly it is just that.

And God hears and answers the prayers I have prayed because He impressed me to pray for them. Sometimes it feels like I should be much more wordy, elaborate and just more everything, but it struck me how very simply I pray for the sales staff and how I keep hearing we continue to hold in a failing market.

Then I thought about the Lord's Prayer. So simple. "Give us this day our daily bread" No flagellation, just a sentence recognizing that our provisions are from God. A simple prayer of "thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever" recognizing God's sovereignty. Jesus spoke about not being like the Pharisees with their many words and prayers on the street corner.

Obedience to the command to pray before trying to impress anyone (including self) with fine, fancy flowing words.

expand my borders, Lord

Posted by Joan Hershberger on August 30, 2010 at 12:47

I was reminded of the Prayer of Jabez last week and inspired to renew a prayer that God would "Expand my borders, please."
I work at a newspaper and like to write. As I prayed, I was thinking, Okay, God, I'm ready to write a book, do something outside of the newspaper world. That was Friday/Saturday praying.
Today, I was told that my weekly 6 page section that we do on kids at school (pictures, articles of topics of interest) has been expanded to 8 pages.
Wow! Eight pages, that is a lot more space to fill up. This section began as two partial pages that I needed to fill.
So my borders were expanded, but not the way I anticipated. But this section is important for the families and kids at school. It provides us with a lot more opportunity to get their pictures in the paper and to recognize their accomplishments.
Just no big recognition for me. I act as information processor and lay out the pages. Humility within my expanded border.
Now to pray for enough material to fill the pages.

It's a God thing

Posted by Joan Hershberger on May 15, 2010 at 22:34

So many times it just feels like "if you don't have enough faith, don't pray hard enough, don't get really into the prayer and faith and trust, then nothing will happen and it will be your fault.
However I was reading Mike Evans "The Unanswered Prayers of Christ" where he felt drained of energy and could not see how he could pray with enough faith for the healing of a child. But he closed his eyes and prayed, thinking nothing will happen, I don't feel it, I am too tired to do it.
And someone told him to open his eyes and look. The child with the severe deformity was healed. Not because he had enough faith or enough time praying or anything ... but because God is the healer.

I must pray as an act of obedience. What God does with that is not my responsibility. I just pray "thy kingdom come, thy will be done" not "I will make your kingdom come and your will be done."
That is a great relief to leave it up to God.

It's not me, it's God

Posted by Joan Hershberger on May 13, 2010 at 4:46

God is working even when I do not realize it.
My car just returned from the radiator repair shop. I said Ouch because it was $600 to repair a major leakage into the oil. The mechanic was amazed that the leak had not been allowed to continue until it cracked the head .... and cost much, much more.
He said I had good hearing. Sure I heard the putt-putt of the engine some days - but not every time - when I started it up. Another mechanic had done $50 worth of work on the radiator system when he saw a leak 3 weeks before. It was not enough. I had plans to make a major drive the day I sent it to the shop, but I just did not get God's permission to go there. All those "No, not now, Not this time." answers to prayer.
So I didn't go 70-120 miles away. I went 7 miles to the mechanic who said, "No, you absolutely can not drive this car 7 miles home."
God's negative answer to my prayer about traveling kept me safely at home, near the shop, and having repairs within my budget. I had a quiet weekend at home, waiting on my husband to return from a trip. He came back in time for me to use his car for a couple days and to talk with the mechanic.
Thank you God, that even when I am not feeling tuned into You as I would like to be, that You are tuned into me and working for my good.

Prayer prompts

Posted by Joan Hershberger on April 12, 2010 at 8:11

Several years ago when God began calling me to increase my prayers, I struggled to know how or what to pray. I have found the prayer prompts definitely help. I wanted to go beyond just "bless me and giveme"

Having come from a non-liturgical church background, we scorned the use of prayer books and written prayers. Not spontaneous. It ounded weird use prayer prompts,

But I found that I never had the same feelings about from conversation prompts I found in books or with the cards from the old game UNO. In fact I used them a great deal to stimulate family conversations and to move onto deeper subjects. The prompts give me questions to ask and discuss. I am pleasantly surprised at the insights I receive from those conversations.

With the increased call to pray, I wanted to have prayer books. I sought them out. I even bought one on ebay,just to have a prayer books. As I read through some of the prayers I was impressed with how much they reflected and incorporated scripture.

As the pastor talked, I noted when he mentioned patterns of prayer and through PRAY! magazine I discovered prayer cards that Ialso use to direct my prayers on specific issues.

I do not use the lists like a robot or a prayer wheel. I use them because there is no need tore-invent the wheel. The patterns, thoughts and examples exist and abound. Christ Himself gave us the Lord's Prayer, and I have discovered and enjoyed the thoughts of others on how they use that prayer as a pattern to one's prayer time.

Recently I S-L-O-W-L-Y read the Psalms and realized, oh ... is that how one praisesGod! I actually found myself writing out some praises of my own echoingthe Psalms. Praise that simply flowed.Astounding. Me flowing with praise in words. Yes, I always appreciated and wondered at God's abundance, but not that way.

I have always wondered HOW Daniel could pray three times a day. But as I write this I realize, with God's blessings, Daniel had plenty for which to praise God, and of course as a leader, plenty of topics on which to seek His wisdom. Now I guess need to sit down and study whatever in recorded of Daniel's prayers to gain insight into the patterns and prompts his prayers provide.

God does not leave us without resources or the means to do what He commands, I just need to look around and see what He had provided.

God commands us to pray

Posted by Joan Hershberger on April 12, 2010 at 7:55

God already knows our needs. He knows our hearts. He knows the outcome, but He still commands us to pray. Once or twice I have been awakened with a really strong impression, "Pray for this person.' So strong a message that I pray. I do not know 'why' I prayed sometimes, but the impression was so strong that I did.

Others have the same experience as in the following testimony my daughter shared with me.

The single woman who had her own business assessing properties felt the economic impact of the last few years. Few people called her with requests to have assessments done. In fact from November through March she had only two assessments. She sought work otherwise to hold her over, but was considering filing for bankruptcy.

As she walked her dog in the park one morning a young woman came up to her. "God told me to go to the park this morning and to pray with, pray for the woman with a dog. You are the only woman here with a dog, so I must be supposed to pray for you." She prayed for the business woman's needs and crisis and then left the park. No names exchanged as far as I can tell.

Within 24 hours the struggling business woman had 10 phone calls for assessments. After five months with only 2, she could only know that this had to be of God.

I was told of this God mandated personal prayer time from my daughter who is related to the woman. Because the woman has also struggled with her beliefs, I am praying it is a turning point for her faith to be deepened and her own prayer life to grow.

Not Daniel but Jonah

Posted by Joan Hershberger on April 10, 2010 at 20:02

I am impressed with Daniel's praying three times a day, faithfully, regularly, even if it meant punishment. I want to be like that, but mostly the last few months I act more like Jonah. God wants me to pray, to set aside time to pray instead of filling up with food, activities or entertainment, and I find a lot of ways to head for Ninevah.
This morning I decided my life's prayer title should be "Just when I thought I would dare to be a Daniel, but I jumped a ship like Jonah." Instead of praying three times a day, I find myself belatedly praying for three days in the belly of the fish because I would not obey immediately.

With the best of determinations to set time aside to pray for some very urgent needs in my church, my community, my children's lives, I find myself reaching for something to distract me, to take up my time, to insure I do NOT spend that time praying.
Again already, I grumble and head for the prayer time, just as soon as I do one more thing ... that is my ongoing battle.

Frequently I wake in the middle of the night knowing, "I did not pray for ..." Since I won't get back to sleep for an hour or two, I get up and try to make amends. I kind of like those middle of the night sessions. Quiet, no one distracting me, I am focused and hearing God and not everything else.