Opinion

Be careful what you wish for

Thursday, September 27, 2001
Dawn Cribbs

A long time ago, when I was still a late-night TV fan, I watched a Night Gallery or Twilight Zone episode where a woman received three wishes, along the line of a monkey's paw or Eye of the Golden Idol fantasy. At about the same time as she received the right to make the wishes, her husband was tragically killed in a catastrophic crash of some kind. With each of her wishes she wished him back, but each granted wish led to even more dire consequences. Her final wish spoken in utter frustration, drew him back, "just as he was, never to die again." Unfortunately, for her and for him, "just as he was" meant he was restored after he had undergone the embalming process. He woke up in excruciating pain with the preservative chemicals pumping through his circulation system. Of course there were no more wishes, and as she had wished him to never die again, the story ended with both of them screaming, her in horror, and he in absolute agony. "Be careful what you wish for," the commentator intoned, "you just may get it."

Prayer can be like that. I love to read the prayer for the Ephesians penned by Paul so many years ago. "For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." Ephesians 3:14-19 (NIV)

A righteous prayer, a prayer for wisdom, knowledge and understanding of who God is and what he has done.

A dangerous prayer. Dangerous because it is lifted to a powerful and righteous God, a God who desires the very same thing for all who would call upon his name, and he orchestrates the answer.

The moral standard for all time is revealed in the Ten Commandments. One, more than any other, has been a point of confession more times than I care to recall. It cannot be skipped over, or skimmed through, it is indeed a stumbling block. It is the one Jesus reiterated in Matthew 22:37 "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest commandment."

In a rare moment of self-honesty, I came to realize that I didn't even know what it meant to love God with all my heart, soul and mind, let alone what it meant to live it and so I came to pray for that commandment to be fulfilled in my heart.

I cannot begin to catalog the upheaval that came into my life after I prayed that prayer. I didn't have a perfect life, certainly not a wealthy life, but a tolerable life, a comfortable routine, a manageable life. I woke each day with a good understanding of what was expected of me in that day and with the strength and ability necessary to accomplish the tasks that accompanied the day. I believed myself to be singularly blessed by God with these good gifts and felt secure in them.

It all fell apart. Job losses, mounting bills, injury, illness, rebellious children, the tolerable life suddenly intolerable. I must admit to a certain level of disappointment, that after having prayed a prayer God would certainly approve of, I had suddenly fallen victim to calamity upon calamity, waking each day with deep uncertainty of what would be required of me. And an even deeper uncertainty that I would have the strength necessary to face up to whatever the day held.

You know where this is going by now, dear reader. I can see your nod of agreement in my mind's eye as I relate what so many have discovered before me. Before you can love God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind, you must first learn to trust Him.

I pray dangerous prayers. Every day. I still pray that someday, if even for just a fleeting moment, my heart will know what it is to fulfill the first commandment. I'm still learning, you see.

And I pray the prayer in Ephesians for the hearts I love, knowing that even as they struggle, they too will learn trust and will discover "the love of Christ and be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." I pray this prayer knowing that in answering the prayer, some lessons will come hard, struggles will come, each one will be called to reach deeply within themselves to find the faith needed to trust God even one more time. I pray this prayer, knowing as a mother, wife, sister, friend, aunt, it will be hard, even heart-breaking, to watch them struggle. Yet I know, that in watching them grow through the hard lessons, their faith as well as my own will increase, as will my own understanding of 'how wide and long and high and deep is the love Christ."

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." Ephesians 3:20, 21 (NIV)

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