From time to time I encourage Daily Encounter subscribers to start his or her day with the following prayer: “Dear God, again today I commit and trust my life and way to you. I am available, please make me usable, use me to be a witness for Jesus, and help me to be ‘as Jesus’ in some way to every life I touch—today!”

I have prayed this prayer every morning for many years and, by the grace of God, plan to pray it every day until the Lord calls me home. The fact is that God uses ordinary everyday people who are available to do his work here on earth—often in unusual ways.

Recently, for example, I was on our sidewalk talking with our gardener when a neighbor walked by and wanted to talk to me. She was deeply hurt over a situation that was caused by another neighbor who had bawled her out. She shared with me what happened and was crying. It upset me too and I ended up crying with her. I then asked if I could hug and pray for her, to which she readily agreed, after which, she genuinely thanked me.

Furthermore, our gardener stepped aside a little but watched the entire event. I’ll bet he never witnessed anything like this before—neither had I.

Reminds me of the hymn that says: “God moves in a mysterious way / His wonders to perform / He plants his footsteps on the seas / And rides upon the storm.”

Again I encourage you to pray the following prayer every morning of your life and see how God will use you too.

Today’s Prayer: “Dear God, again today I commit and trust my life and way to you. I am available, please make me usable and use me to be a witness for Jesus, and help me to be ‘as Jesus’ in some way to every life I touch. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. 1 John 5:14-15 (NKJV).

“You probably read about Paddy who was driving down the street in a sweat because he had an important meeting and couldn’t find a parking place.

“Looking up to heaven he said, ‘Lord take pity on me. If you find me a parking place I will go to Mass every Sunday for the rest of me life and give up me Irish whiskey.’

“Miraculously, a parking place appeared.

“Paddy looked up again and said, ‘Never mind, I found one.’”²

While we make jokes about such things, I wonder how often I pray, God answers, and I forget to say thank you … or fail to even see that God has answered my prayer because it wasn’t in the way that I expected it to be.

The fact is, when my prayer is sincere from the heart, God always hears and answers it. Sometimes the answer is “Yes,” sometimes it is “No,” and sometimes it is “Wait a while.” And sometimes it is in a way that is totally different from what I expected.

The important thing is that we always thank God for hearing and answering our prayers regardless of the way in which they are answered, because God always knows what is best for us. Let’s not be like the ten lepers whom Jesus healed and only one came back to acknowledge and thank Jesus for healing him.

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, thank you that you always hear and answer my prayers in one way or another. May I always have a grateful heart and learn to thank you regardless of the way in which you answer my prayer. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. Luke 17:17 (NIV).

2. Author unknown.

In 1953 reporters gathered at a Chicago railway station waiting to meet the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize winner.

He was a big man, six-feet-four tall with bushy hair and a large mustache.

Reporters were excited to see him and expressed what an honor it was meet him. Cameras were flashing, compliments were being expressed—but seeing beyond the adulation the visitor noticed an elderly Afro-American woman struggling to carry her two large suitcases.

“Excuse me,” he said as he went to the aid of this woman. Picking up her cases, he escorted her to a bus and then apologized to the reporters for keeping them waiting.

The man was Dr. Albert Schweitzer, the famous missionary-doctor who had invested his life helping poor and sick people in Africa.

A member of the reception committee remarked to one of the reporters, “That’s the first time I ever saw a sermon walking.”

The measure of any man or woman is not their name, their fame, nor what they say—but what they do.

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, please help me to be a doer of your Word and not just a hearer. Grant that my life will also be a sermon walking. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. James 1:22.

Brennan Manning in his book, The Ragamuffin Gospel, tells about a child caught on the second floor of his house when it was on fire. The family members were all running out of the house when the smallest boy panicked and ran back upstairs.

Terrified, he screamed from a smoke-filled window. Below, his father could see him and cried out, “Jump, son, jump! I’ll catch you.” “But daddy, I can’t see you,” the boy cried.

“I know,” the father called, “but I can see you.”

The father could see the son and that’s all that really mattered.

Many a time in our lives we are in difficult situations and we panic and long for God to help us. But not being able to see him, or sense his presence, we don’t know what to do. Let us always remember that God is there regardless of our feelings. He can see us. And when we call to him and choose to put our trust in him, he will help us. He is our refuge. Underneath us are his everlasting arms. And he loves us with an everlasting love.

“And that may be all we need to know!”

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, please help me to commit and trust my life and way to you when darkness surrounds me and I am lost and do not know the way. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. Deuteronomy 33:27 (NIV).

I have read how, “In the mid-1980s, an Avianca Airlines jet crashed in the mountains of Spain. Investigators reviewing the incident made a startling discovery. Recordings from the black box revealed that several minutes prior to impact, a computer-synthesized voice from the plane’s automatic warning system told the flight crew on repeated occasion to ‘Pull up!’ The pilot, evidently thinking that the system was not functioning properly, switched the system off. Minutes later they plowed into the ground killing passengers as well as crew.”²

It may be true that “all roads lead to Rome” even if part of the way is via the ocean, but it is not true that all religions lead to God and Heaven. When we decide to not listen to what God says about life beyond death, or deem that his Word is incorrect and make our own rules or decide for ourselves as to what qualifies one for entering God’s heaven, we place ourselves above God and become a god unto ourselves—and are on a direct course for a lost eternity, separated from God and all that is godly and good, in the place that God’s Word, the Bible, calls hell.

Jesus made it very clear when he said: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father [God] except through me.³ And God’s Word makes it very clear that “it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.”⁴

Just as imperative as it is that pilots listen to their plane’s warning system, so is it that we listen to God’s “warning system” as found in his Word, the Bible.

For help to make sure you are following God’s directives for life after death, be sure to read the article, “How to Know God and be sure you’re a real Christian” at: www.actsweb.org/christian.

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, thank you for the wonderful ‘warning system’ you have given to mankind via your Word, the Bible. Please give me a hunger to read, learn, and understand what you have to say therein—and the good sense to always adhere to and follow your instructions for this life as well as the life to come. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. Exodus 8:15 (NIV).

2. Mike Benson, Oakhill Church of Christ, http://www.oakhillcoc.org.

3. John 14:6 (NIV).

4. Ephesians 2:8-9 (NIV).

A young boy asked his mother if she would go with him to his elementary school’s first teacher-parent conference. To his surprise she said she would go. This embarrassed the boy because, though his mother was beautiful, she had a terrible scar right across one side of her face.

This was the first time his teacher and classmates saw his mother and because of his embarrassment, he withdrew from them and tried to hide himself. However, he overheard his teacher ask how his mother’s face was scarred.

“When my son was a baby,” the mother replied, “he was in a room that caught on fire. Everyone was afraid to go in because the fire was out of control, so I went in. As I was running toward his crib, I saw a beam coming down and I placed myself over him to shield him. I was knocked unconscious but fortunately, a fireman came in and saved both of us…the scar is permanent but to this day, I have never regretted doing what I did.”

Hearing what his mother did for him, the boy ran towards her with tears in his eyes. He hugged her and felt an overwhelming sense of thanks for the sacrifice she made to save his life.²

May we, too, feel an overwhelming sense of gratitude for the sacrifice Jesus Christ made for us in giving his life to save us from our sins and a lost eternity.

Suggested prayer: “Dear Jesus God, once again I thank you for all that you did for me in giving your life to save me from a lost eternity. I offer my life as a living sacrifice to live for and serve you. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus’ name, amen.”

Note: If you have never thanked God for giving his Son, Jesus, to die in your place so your sins could be forgiven, and thanked Jesus for doing this for you, so you could also be given the gift of eternal life to live with God in Heaven after this life, then I encourage you to do this today. For help, please read the article, “God’s Invitation,” at: http://tinyurl.com/gods-invitation; and/or the article, “How to Be Sure You’re a Real Christian—without having to be religious” at: www.actsweb.org/christian.

1. John 4:9-10 (NLT).

2. Adapted from a story by Lih Yuh Kuo in Chicken Soup for the Soul.

Jonathon (name changed), a Daily Encounter readers writes: “In response to views on abortion, I certainly don’t support the irresponsibility and thoughtlessness of the sex that abortionists support. I will only say the only thing worse than having an abortion is having an unwanted child. I know, I am one.”

How extremely sad it is to come into the world as an unwanted child, and if we remain unwanted by our own parents, this can be very emotionally damaging. If truth be told, however, who knows how many of us were unwanted … that is, unwanted (or at least unplanned) by the ones who brought us into the world?

Carol, a dear friend of ours, shared how when she was 14 her mother told her that when she was pregnant with her, her doctor told her that she wasn’t strong enough to bear another child and that she should abort. She did—but it was her fraternal twin—but she held on and survived. Even now, many years later, she is still finding it very difficult to overcome this memory of her lost sibling.

On the other hand, many years ago when my youngest son was only about ten or so, he was very angry at me—about something that I have long since forgotten—and in his frustration blurted out, “Why did you have me anyhow?”

I replied, “Because you were a part of God’s eternal plan.”

And that is true of Jonathon, Carol, you, and me. We were born into this world because we are a part of God’s eternal plan, and God knew us long before we were ever thought of in this world. God wanted us and still wants us. He loves us devotedly and has a purpose for each of us. A vital part of living a meaningful life is finding and fulfilling that purpose. The same is also true of every aborted child in that they, too, were known and loved by God before the foundation of the world.

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, please help me to know and feel in the very core of my being that I am wanted and loved by you, my Heavenly Father, and help me to live a life according to your purpo­­se for my life. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully, in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. Ephesians 1:4 (NKJV).

A Daily Encounter reader asks, “As the Bible seems to indicate that our days are numbered, should we (and can we) attempt to extend our lives through better diet, surgery, and medications? And if our days are numbered, why should we pray for the healing of loved ones, our military, and others?”

Hi, Mike … When David asked God to show him the number of his days, I don’t believe he was implying that he (or we) had x number of days to live and that’s it. As David indicated, it really means that life is fleeting and our days on earth are limited, so we need to do the best we can with the one life we have been given.

Furthermore, God said to Solomon in a dream, “If you walk in my ways and obey my statutes and commands as David your father did, I will give you a long life.”² This indicates that if we live in harmony with God’s Word, will, and ways (which includes healthy living habits), under normal circumstances we can lengthen our life. Also the fifth of the Ten Commandments says, “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.”³

On the other hand, there is no doubt that we can shorten our life by not living in harmony with God’s ways, through an unhealthy diet, lack of exercise, nursing grudges, an unforgiving spirit, unresolved super-charged repressed negative emotions, impaired relational conflicts, too much stress and anxiety, addictive behaviors and/or substances, and any of a score or more of other unhealthy habits and ways of living.

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, please help me to so live in harmony with your will and the principles for healthy living as found in your Word, that my life on earth will be healthy, long, and fruitful for the glory of your Name. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. Psalm 39:4 (NIV).

2. 1 Kings 3:14 (NIV).

3. Exodus 20:12 (NIV).

I have read how on one occasion when visiting Scotland Queen Mary “was strolling with a group of children. Suddenly the sky turned gray and thick, dark clouds appeared. The queen stopped at a nearby house and asked if she might borrow an umbrella. She told the lady of the house, ‘I’ll send it back to you tomorrow.’ The lady was understandably reluctant about lending a good umbrella to a total stranger, but she remembered that she had an old one in the attic. One rib was broken and there were several ragged holes in it, but she nevertheless, turned it over to this lady at her front door with a weak apology.

“The next day there was another knock at the door. This time, when she opened it, a man in gold braid stood with a big envelope in hand. ‘The queen sent me,’ he said, ‘and asked me to thank you for the umbrella.’”²

Can you imagine how this woman must have felt knowing she gave the Queen a broken umbrella and didn’t give her best.

For those of us who claim to be Christians I wonder how we will feel at the end of life’s journey when we stand face to face with Jesus to give account of our stewardship and realize that we didn’t give God our best—but only our broken “unwanteds.”

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, in my service to you please help me always to give of my best so that when I stand before you face to face, I will not be ashamed or embarrassed. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayer. Gratefully in Jesus’ name, amen.”

1. Matthew 25:40 (NIV).

2. Mike Benson, Oakhill Church of Christ, http://www.oakhillcoc.org/