Sam
Tiffin's mom, Bonnie, ushered silver-haired Noah into the kitchen and
take a seat. Sam and his orange-haired teen buddy, Ben were already
seated. They had been talking about some ideas for a product that
their imaginary business could produce and sell. Noah touched the
shoulder of each boy, and with loving eye contact, told the boys how
much he loved being accepted as their sort-of Gramps.
Sam
did a great job with the opening prayer, thanking God for Gramps'
friendship and caring so deeply for the boys. Bonnie, leaning against
the kitchen doorway was silently praising God for the partnering of
the three at her kitchen table. In her heart she almost begged God to
keep Satan away from harming the unity that was clearly brightening
her spirits and those of the three 'business' partners at the table.
Bonnie
headed for her spare bedroom sewing basket as Gramps set a brown
paper bag on the table in front of them. He began, “Fellas, any
time you want to make this old man hear a happy tune in my heart, all
you gotta do is make a prayer from your heart that I can hear. I can
remember so many dark dreary days in my life, that my precious Nenee
and I would hold hands over a Bible and hear the other go before the
Lord in prayer. And not a one of them was a 'Gimme Prayer', either.
Ben
interrupted with, “Gramps. Hold on, a minute! What'd you say? A
'Gimme Prayer'? I never heard of one of those before. When do you say
a Gimme Prayer?” “Well, Ben, hopefully never. See, lots of folks,
young and old, think prayer is a 'Dear God – give me this or give
me that.' You know what I'm saying, 'gimme this or gimme that.' To my
way of thinking, prayer isn't putting in an order for something you
need or want. That misses the whole point of prayer.”
Gramps
slowly moved his fingers over the pages of the open kitchen Bible,
like he was smoothing them. He continued with, “Boys, this Bible
tells us over and over, that God knows everything. He knows even
better than we do, what we need and should have, and when. We want to
be reminded of someone's love and trust by those we love. Well God is
the same way. When we speak to Him, we should first tell Him how much
we love Him. Almost the last thing in our prayer, we should tell Him
our need, and that we'll trust His provisions according to HIS will
not our own wishes. He proves over and over, He knows what we need
most and when. The best example of that is His Son Jesus becoming our
sacrifice for our sins on the Cross.
