Jesus, I wonder if the little boy with the five small loaves of bread and two small fish woke up that day planning to give You all he had. What would You do if I surrendered all I had for the day, instead of the parts that cost me nothing? Would You take my offering, give thanks and distribute it to those who would seat themselves with You and provide as much as they wanted?
Years ago I remember when I began attending my first Bible study group, the leader warned us all we would each have a turn opening the group up with a devotion. I didn’t even know what that was. First I’d been wrangled into leading discussion groups, which meant I had to join this study group,
now I was being asked to do something equally as foreign to me as studying the Bible…on my own. I’d been perfectly content the few years I’d been going to church just listening to others teach me the fruit of their labor. It honestly hadn’t occurred to me to study it myself. But You. You, Father, You had other plans didn’t You?
By the time my turn came around I had been listening for weeks to a Christian music station and had heard a song that for the first time caused me to pull over onto the side of the road. You remember that day too, right? Somewhere in the middle of the opening crescendo I started making it my prayer to You and by a couple minutes into it I knew You had plans for me. You would in fact make me Your instrument. All I had to do was give You all I had.
I yanked the car into the shoulder and started ugly crying while illegally parked on the side of Highway 14 with two worried preschoolers in the back seat. After we all settled down and You got us safely home I remembered asking You what I had to offer.
I was a clinically depressed mess. An untrained mess. I had two small children, an unbelieving husband and a ridiculously low Bible IQ. I started reading from the New International Reader’s Version and the toddler Bible story cards I bought for my kids because I didn’t always understand the “Big Girl’s Bible” I bought for the study of Romans You put me in. Romans? Really? Why did You introduce me to the world of Bible studies with Romans? It was like asking my kids to read a grad student’s law dissertation for their doctoral degree! But then again, so it would have been with any book of the Bible at that point.
That’s the loaves and fishes I brought to the table. What on earth would You do with that?
Plenty it turns out. Look at us now!
I prepared for my devotional. I decided I was going to play that song for the ladies, and ask them to do what I did…turn it into a prayer for their life. That was it. Take the words of that song and let them sink in to become part of them like it did me. Make it their heart’s cry to You to transform us all into Your instruments. That was the prayer I led with before I let them listen to the song with their eyes closed because of a verse You showed me leading up to my turn, Zephaniah 3:17, The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in His love He will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.
I had no idea what that would look like for them, but wasn’t that the point of the loaves and fishes? You take what we give to You, then You multiply it to feed whoever will sit and listen to You. The women that day sat quietly in their chairs listening and responding with their own prayers of surrender. I watched You work as some wept, some squirmed and some let out a long held breath.
When the song ended, I explained that I didn’t know what it was going to look like to become an instrument for God to work through, but I wanted to be ready to give God all of me and that I wanted to at least be willing to give Him whatever He asked. The little boy in John 6 may not have known he would be asked to give Jesus all he had, but Jesus had a plan in place to feed the multitudes if he did.
Jesus spoke to him a third time. He asked, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter felt bad because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He answered, “Lord, you know all things. You know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep."
About Diary of an Answered Pray-er
Slut. Failure. Quitter. Angry. Depressed. Addict. Those are identities I put on like a thread-bare security blanket for years. Now they sometimes walk alongside me like a deviant service dog that doesn’t want me to cross the street. A street that leads me into the land of God’s Promises, which declare my – and your – true identity. Forgiven. Pure. Daughter. Conqueror. Loved. Light. Free.
Once I entered this new land of God’s Promises over 25 years ago, I couldn’t get enough. I collected them, displayed them, talked about them and was constantly on the lookout for more. I led Bible studies rooted in them. I gifted a Promise Book to every woman I led in those studies. Then God punched me in the gut.
“Rhonda. Do you BELIEVE them? For you?”
Well…maybe not.
Until I did.
Diary of an Answered Pray-er is a ongoing journey that courses through storms Rhonda has faced…abuse, death, mental health, addiction, broken relationships, career choices, crises of faith, and BELIEF. Here you’ll find heartfelt, raw prayers and God’s radical answers. Perhaps you find yourself in the middle of your own raging storms whimpering, like the desperate boy’s father in Mark 9:24, “I DO believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” Maybe in reading these prayers you’ll be encouraged to BELIEVE the promise found in Psalm 34:8 is also for YOU. “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in Him“.
Rhonda currently lives in Wenatchee, WA with her husband of 36 years, relishing the outrageous joys of marriage, being a Nana, skiing, gardening, taking spontaneous road trips and sampling plenty of dark chocolate.
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