During this morning’s sermon, the preacher briefly touched on the recent suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain. These are two names known the world over! Anthony for his adventurous culinary appetite and Kate Spade for her fashion empire. As I drove home from service I couldn’t help but think, was there no one who checked in on these two? I realize the world over didn’t have the ability to text and say “Hey, was thinking about you, just checking in” but surely someone in their sphere was thinking about them in the days and weeks leading up to their death. Why didn’t they check in? Or did people check in but they just felt hopelessly alone in the midst of a crowd?
As is often the case when I get to pondering, this segued into another stream of thought. Growing up my Mom was (and is) the epitome of what you call a “Prayer Warrior.” She prays for anybody on any subject at any time. If she wakes up at 3AM, I can almost guarantee that she’s in prayer. With this model, I couldn’t help but grow to love prayer as well, so most of my adult years when a name or situation came to mind I’d first, pray and then second, type out a quick text or social media based message to the person. I added this second step because personally, when I found myself in deep dark valley seasons, it was those quick notes of thought that kept me moving forward.
Even today, as I was standing during singing in worship, a name came to mind that I couldn’t find a rhyme or reason for. They weren’t even in the room, so there was no firm context where this person should be on my mind and yet, there they were. So I prayed – not long, not even really with concrete words because I don’t really know their story at present, but I prayed and then sent a quick note that simply read “Prayed for you today. Wherever you find yourself today, may you worship well.”
If you follow my blogs, you know my passion for music. A few years ago there was a song that struck a chord with me (no pun intended). In an ironic twist the title “Lead Us Back” had the opposite effect on me. One quick line says, “Prayed for those we’d like to know / Favour sings a siren tune” and boy was I bowled over by this line. Wow. Even know I remember falling to my seat in reflection of my prayer life. But not in a good way. You see, in fearing any possible ulterior motivations, I subsequently stopped praying all together. You know what happened? I quickly found I missed communion with God, and further, I missed connecting with people. I longed to hear people’s stories, understand their hearts! Not in a gossipy “in-the-know” sort of way, but in a way that allowed me to walk alongside them in their struggles, support them in their weaknesses, celebrate with them in their joys.
So I quickly abandoned the fear of “what’s my motivation” in favour of listening to the Holy Spirit. You see, I firmly believe that God uses His Spirit to open our hearts and prick our minds. When we attune to that prompting, He can use us in ways we never dreamed. That quick text, that phone call, that hand-written card, can change a life. Further I believe it has the power to save a life be it physically or spiritually! Maybe God is using me, using you, in that moment to remind someone else that He is there. Remind them that life is not only worth living, it’s worth living well because someone loved us enough to build this amazing creation for us.
I’ve sent countless messages through the years. I know some have been mightily appreciative of that moment where I not only thought about and/or prayed for them but took a minute to acknowledge them but there are also many times where I don’t know what the reader thought (or even if they got my message!) But even now I am reminded that “checking in” isn’t about me, at its deepest level it’s not even about the other person, but for Christians it is about listening for the Holy Spirit and being obedient: even when it doesn’t make sense, even when we don’t know the outcomes.
We might not know on this side of Heaven what our prayers and “check ins” might mean – but I truly believe that in the hindsight of eternity, we’ll be amazed at, not what we did but, what He did through us!
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