ANOTHER ANSWERED PRAYER
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GOD ANSWERS PRAYER.
I was reading the story about answered prayer in this publication, and it reminded me of something God did for me not long after I became a Christian. I had led a pretty rough life in my teens and early 20’s. I was alcoholic and had other problems. I committed my life to Jesus at 24 years old and became a resident at a Christian Centre in Auckland, New Zealand. It was a sort of rehab place for people who needed help to let God sort out their lives.
The place was a faith Ministry. They trusted God to supply most of their needs and to keep the place running. About 15 of us were residents and we were still a rough bunch. Some had been in prison, been violent, had been prostitutes, and had mental and emotional problems. We were all still self centered, and retained a lot of the rough edges from our former lives. I remember once we had run out of food. The staff got us all to sit at the table and we prayed for God to supply food. Most of us were pretty impatient with all this faith and prayer stuff. We were just hungry and where is the food?
This time our praying was interrupted by The Nun’s from the convent across the road, arriving with a big tray of liver and bacon pie. Nobody had told them of our need.
My personal answer to prayer made a big impression on me. Again the place was short on supplies and we were asked to ask God what He wanted us individually to believe Him for. They put up a blackboard in the common room and each of us wrote our names, and what we were believing God for. All sorts of items were there. Toothpaste, soap and many other items. I wrote green vegetables as my entry.
Within a few weeks all of the items came in and those entries were erased from the blackboard. The only item left on the board was my green vegetables. I was very down in the mouth about that, and had an attitude it was not fair my item had not been supplied.
Two months later all of us attended a Christmas meeting at an Auckland Church. We formed a singing group and performed at the meeting. I had a leadership role in the group. At the end of the meeting a man came up to me and asked me to follow him to his car outside. He opened the boot to reveal three of the biggest cabbages I had ever seen. They must have been 40 cm across. You could only carry one at a time. That was my answered prayer. I was very happy to erase my item off the blackboard that evening.
Even though I still had a lot of rough edges, God had taught me a valuable lesson about faith. It became an important foundation in my future life with Jesus.
