THE INTERRUPTED PRAYER
WHO WAS MY SPIRITUAL MENTOR? Besides my missionary parents and teachers, it was Hilda . . . a 50-year-old woman when I was 15. Hilda came to our house on Mondays each week; she cleaned house in the mornings and spent the afternoons ironing.
After school and homework, I planted a chair in front of Hilda’s ironing board, and we talked till she finished. She told many stories of having four young children to raise alone after her husband’s death. With almost no education, she did domestic work to earn a living for the five of them. She was always below poverty level, but the Lord came through time after time after time.
I’ll always remember one particular story she told me. She had worked all day, but the woman she worked for said her husband had not returned from work, leaving her with no money. She asked Hilda to return the next day for her pay.
So Hilda turned to her best Friend, Jesus. “Lord, we have no food in the house, and now I can’t buy any. Please, Jesus, provide something, at least for the children. It doesn’t matter whether I eat or not.”
As she walked past a certain house, a woman came running out. “Lady, does your family like watery rice?” she asked Hilda. “My rice turned out all soupy, and I know my family won’t eat it, but I hate for it to go to waste. Will you take it, please?”
Hilda walked on, carrying watery rice and thanking the Lord for providing an evening meal for them. Things such as this happened again and again for her.
HIS HANDS
Late one Friday afternoon I saw my mom’s homemade bread cooling in the kitchen. Remembering how much Hilda liked it, I took some and ran the short distance to her house (which was one small room only). After knocking vigorously on the open door, I looked inside and saw her kneeling by her chair.
Suddenly I felt very awkward. So when she came to the door, I thrust the bread into her hands and ran home. I didn’t see her until our usual Monday encounter at the ironing board.
She started by explaining, “Last Friday I hoped to get off work early enough to walk to the store to buy bread. But when I finally finished, I saw I could get there and pay for the bread, but I couldn’t make it back home before sundown. I didn’t want to be hurrying home from an errand when the Sabbath began, so I knelt and prayed, ‘Lord, we don’t have much to eat for Sabbath, so we really need some bread.’ Then I heard a knock at the door, and there you were, holding out bread to me!”
I felt so honored to have been the one the Lord used to answer His faithful servant’s plea for food!
We have a wonderful heavenly Father who knows our needs and answers prayers. Go to Him with all your challenges; cast your worries upon Him and trust in Him. He is never early, but He is never late either. Remember how He has led you in the past and trust in His love and care for the present. “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7, NIV).
