Today is the 17th day of Lent, a 40 day season of spiritual reflection, repentance, and renewal. During these 40 days we’ll explore the prayer life of Jesus, walking chronologically through every mention of Jesus’ prayer life and prayers in the Gospels.
Here is today’s prayer event: 33When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled. 34And he said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” 35 Jesus wept. 36So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” 37But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man also have kept this man from dying?” 38Then Jesus, deeply moved again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay against it. 39Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.” 40Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?” 41So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up his eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 I knew that you always hear me, but I said this on account of the people standing around, that they may believe that you sent me.” (John 11:33-42 ESV).
Timothy Jones (“Praying Like the Jew, Jesus” (70)) points out that Jesus did not speak this prayer of thanksgiving after Lazarus has been raised from the dead. Jesus speaks this prayer of thanksgiving while Lazarus is still decomposing in a tomb. Jesus is not thanking God because he is certain God will raise Lazarus. He thanks God simply because God hears him. What did God hear? Jones argues that God heard Jesus’ tears: “When [Jesus] found himself in the shadow of his friend’s tomb, he couldn’t put his prayers into words, so he put them into tears instead. And his Father heard his cries.” Jones concludes: “Perhaps it’s because at the heart of all our prayers, what we really want is not an answer but an assurance—an assurance that our Father is listening.”
Jesus thanks God simply because God hears. Even in the midst of a painful time, Jesus believes that God hears. And here, that’s all Jesus needs.
Is it enough for you to know that God hears? Why? Why not? Take a few moments and just thank God for his open ears, for the way his door is always open, for how God is always willing to listen.
[image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ggiupponitn/3358862103/]
On a Monday like I am having today, it is enough for me that the Lord hears my cries. So many little things are going wrong, annoyances that feel like little gnats whining around your head in the summer. Nothing really important, just annoying, like the tea bag breaking so now my tea is full of leaves. Like forgetting to take my Claritin this morning, so I am resigned to being foggy-headed and headachy all day. Like the mouse on the laptop I use all day for instruction dying suddenly just now. I don’t expect God to fix all these minor irritations (although it would, of course, be nice), but it gives me a quiet peacefulness to remember that He is always listening to my prayers, to my complaints and praises. It is enough to know He is there. Just that knowledge gets me through these “Mondays”, especially while I am wandering in the desert for these 40 days.
I know God hears. And I know I believe He can fix anything. Sometimes I wonder why He doesn’t. I guess it would be really cool to follow Jesus through this hospital watching Him heal EVERYBODY. But other than being unemployed I believe many folks would miss out on God’s use of their infirmities, God’s use of minor and major illnesses, and even God’s use of death to build character, teach lessons, mold lives, etc. Still, it would still be amazing. So in my finite human weakness I just have to wonder why He doesn’t. But that does not stop me from praying. Because every once in a while He does heal people and restore what even the doctors thought could not be restored.
Every now and then a student drops by my room to talk about something that is going on in their life. They are confused or hurting or lonely or questioning and they think I can help them. What I find more often then not is that they have the answers already, they just need to talk to get them to the surface or they just need help verbalizing what they already know to be true.
I think that is what prayer is more often than not: God listening and maybe guiding a bit as we begin to sort out what we already know to be true deep down inside. So, yes, it is more than enough to know that God is listening.
i’m thankful God can hear tears and laughter, a heart beating in fear, eyelids heavy with exhaustion…. i’m thankful he can hear emotions as prayers when we have no words and when our hearts are in tune with him.
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