Don't write things down.

Don't pray prayers- and definitely don't write them down- unless you are prepared for God to answer them...

A week ago I came upon this in my journal, written May 18th.

Abba Father... You are so good, so gracious, so merciful, so patient, so infinitely worthy of all the glory and honor.  I worship You because You ARE, and You have allowed me to see YOUR TRUTH and know and experience Your love.  All else may fade away, but I will continuously worship You- not for what you give and take away, but for who You are.  Help me to keep my eyes set on You and You alone, finding my satisfaction, my worth, my joy, my identity, my purpose, my hope, my life in You alone.  When I begin to look elsewhere for any of these things, please do whatever it takes to draw me back to You.  I know that is a dangerous prayer, but I would rather lose everything and be in intimate communion with You than to have anything of this world at the cost of closeness with You.  10 years ago I said I was all in, and I meant it, and I mean it even more now.   

You are everything.

Just 2 months after writing this my car essentially died, and not quite 4 months after writing it I found out I was losing my job.  Those are probably the 2 biggest "things of this world" that I have.  Apparently God answers prayer...

The night I found this in my journal I was at the CCDA conference and the speaker said this one sentence that felt like a direct message from God right to me.  "Sometimes God turns your something into nothing so that He gets all the glory."  He gave the example of Gideon's army in Judges 6-7.  The Isrealites had been enslaved to Midian due to their sin, and then they cried out to God.  An angel comes to Gideon and tells Him that the Lord is with him, and Gideon responds by questioning the faithfulness of the Lord in light of Isreal's current situation.  The Lord (not the angel) then tells Gideon to go save Isreal himself, but to remember that God sent him.  Gideon basically tells God to prove it, and a pattern of God "proving" Himself and Gideon still not totally believing ensues.  Fast forward... Gideon pulls together a legit army (33,000 men), but God knew that their strength might cause people to attribute their victory to the army rather than God.  So He tells Gideon to trim the army down.  God looks at the smaller crew and sees that they still might be strong enough to fight on their own.  So He tells Gideon to keep trimming it.  Once the army was so small (300 men) that they clearly had no chance, God tells Gideon to go take the Midian camp that He has given them victory over.  (My retelling of the story- not an exegetical recount by any means.)  Sometimes God takes your something and turns it into nothing so that He will get all the glory...

This was a crushing word that also gave me great vision and hope.  In my current situation and the ministry He has called me to, God turning my something into nothing isn't Him shutting the door- He didn't tell Gideon to not go overtake the Midianites.  He just wanted to make sure that everyone would know that HE was the one who saved Israel and gave them victory over the Midianites.  God turning my something into nothing is actually His affirmation that He is going to do mighty things through me/us, AND He wants everyone (me, first and foremost) to see that it's all from Him and through Him and for His glory.  And in seeing that, I (and all who see) will worship Him for who He is.  Which is what I asked for in that prayer I wrote in my journal...

So really, pray the bold and "dangerous" prayers- and write them down- and then believe that God hears your prayers and will answer them.  It will quite possibly be painful and scary, but He is faithful- to His glory and to those who call on His name.