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The Answer to Someone Else’s Prayer
By Dana Fee
February 28, 2000
As a child in Sunday School, I learned that when I pray for something, God's typical answers are "yes," "no," or "wait a
while." "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find;
knock, and it shall be opened unto you" (Matthew 7:7) tells me that God
answers prayer. However, through life, I realize it's not always in the way I
expect.
In prayer I often tell God my need or problem, and then I have a tendency to
offer a few of my own suggestions on how He could answer that particular need.
Then I'm often shocked when God answers in a totally different way. My
expectations were met in an unexpected fashion. Let me share a personal story
how God answered my prayer with the unexpected.
I was traveling with my father, a missionary to Eastern Europe, on a ten-day
trip to the Ukraine. We had spent much of the night driving and had stopped to
catch a few hours of uncomfortable sleep in the car. When morning came we
stopped to eat at a hotel (the only safe place to eat) in the first big city we
found. After attaching a "club" (anti-theft) device to the steering
wheel, we went inside for a bowl of hot soup. After our meal we returned to the
car, relieved that our car was still there, hubcaps and all. As my dad unlocked
the car, I sat down and heard him yell in frustration and with anguish. He had
put the club on, forgetting that he didn't have the correct set of keys with
which to unlock it. So, there we sat in our car with the car keys in hand, yet,
unable to go anywhere because of the locked steering wheel.
Though my dad knows neither Ukrainian nor Russian, and my knowledge of
Russian was very limited at the time, he went to find a hardware store as I
began to pray. Meanwhile, my faith was high, and I thought it would be grand if
I prayed the club off while my dad was looking for tools. So, first I explained
the problem to God and expressed my great faith in Him that He could do all
things. Then, I told God that He could just pop it off while I laid hands on it.
When that didn't happen, I suggested that God could help me pick the lock with a
hairpin. So, I was diligently picking the lock in great faith when my distraught
father returned empty-handed.
While I continued praying, he went out again to find help. Shortly, he
returned with a cab driver to whom I tried to explain the situation in my broken
Russian. Within 10 minutes, the man had the club off with his handy-dandy tools.
My delighted father tipped him generously. I learned several lessons that day:
one, God does answer prayer; two, God does it in His own way; and three, God
likes to use other people to be an answer to prayer.
At times, God prepares answers to our prayers long before we pray. When you
read about Joseph in the book of Genesis, you discover that when seven years of
famine came to Egypt and the surrounding lands, Joseph was an answer to many
peoples' prayers, even his own starving family in Canaan. Yet, God had prepared
Joseph for years before anyone ever prayed to God about supplying the food. God
prepared Joseph to be in the right place at the right time long before the
famine came. Have you ever thought what would have happened if the wine bearer
had remembered Joseph when his job was restored at the palace? Joseph could have
been freed from prison. Then how would Pharaoh have ever found Joseph when he
needed a dream interpreter? Even though Joseph probably wondered why, he stayed
in prison two more years in order to be in the perfect place to accomplish God’s
purpose in his life. When famine came, many families probably prayed for food
and then learned that Egypt had grain to sell because of Joseph's God-given
wisdom and leadership as governor of Egypt.
Could you be an answer to someone's prayer? Most certainly! Just like the
Ukrainian cab driver that answered my prayers and Joseph answered the prayers of
many starving people, you can be an answer to prayer. Maybe you are experiencing
trials and problems, and, like Joseph, you may not understand that God is
preparing you to be an answer to prayer. If you have needs, problems, or
requests for which you have been praying, trust God. Praise Him because He has
already prepared the answer and that He will give it to you in His way, in His
time, according to His purpose that He may receive all the glory in your life.
ninetyandnine.com
© Dana Fee, 2000
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Dana Fee has been a Missionary’s Kid in Europe, spent two formative
years in California, was a missionary to Russia, and is now a pastor’s wife in
Iowa. (At least two of these geographic locations are considered foreign
fields.)
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