Praying Down the Line

 

“Help us to the right use of our minds…”  That sentence, given in a prayer before a meal 80 or more years ago by my Grandfather, and was heard by a six year old boy who was at the table, prompted that boy to become a Psychiatrist at a time when such a vocation was not well-received by his faith tradition.

Vernon, that six year old boy and my first cousin, became a healer of the mind and was well-known in central Kansas during his career at Prairie View in Newton.  His son Jim recently told me the story of a remarkable answer to prayer in the life of his father.

My guess is that Vernon and my grandfather, Sol, didn’t have a psychiatric career in mind for Vernon when he gave that prayer.  I rather believe he was invoking God’s protection from various kinds of dementias and brain disorders, as one of his sons suffered from some kind of neurological disorder and lived a relatively short life.

Nevertheless, the idea that came to Vernon in his young days as a result of those words was just as much an answer to that prayer as was Sol Plank’s long life…his mind ever sharp until his last day.

As a corollary to this story, I have often wondered how many prayers have been given over the decades, and yes, even centuries, by Godly men and women of old in my ancestry who prayed for their descendants…people they would never know.  And I have to think that one of those descendants is me.  The thought of my ancestors praying for my welfare is humbling to say the least, and brings out a kind of guilt in me because I have not done much of that kind of praying for those who will be descended from me in the coming decades and centuries.

The timeless God who already knows those who will come after me, even though they aren’t a gleam in anyone’s eye right now, hears those kinds of prayers and acts upon them in His time and in His way.  We don’t have a clue what the world will be like in a hundred, two hundred, or five hundred years.  Yet we can pray that those who come after us will be seekers of God, followers of Jesus Christ, and indwelt by the Spirit of God.  We can pray that they will be like Jesus and display His love as they navigate whatever the world offers at that time.  We can pray that they understand that the Kingdom of God is not of this world and is to be sought and cherished more than anything the world has to offer.  We can pray that, like Vernon, they will choose a course in life that heals rather than hurts, unites rather than divides, and helps rather than hinders.

I don’t know what your prayer life is like.  But if it’s like mine, you’re probably stuck in the here and now praying about events, situations, and people in the immediate time.  There’s nothing wrong with that, but I encourage you to expand your thoughts about prayer to include those who will follow you…people you will never meet or know.  If nothing else, pray that they will know God, will know Jesus Christ.  As Paul the great apostle said to the Philippians, “I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death.”  I want my descendants to also know Christ in this way.

Thanks for listening today.  May your day be filled with blessing.