Participating With the Eternal
All of my children liked to “help” me in the kitchen. I remember the pressing busy nights when one of the kids would wander into the kitchen, pull a stool up to the counter and ask me to show them how to do something. So many times, it was so much easier to just do it, but they wanted to be part of the process. When dinner was ready, whoever volunteered was quick to take credit. But the work I had to do behind the scenes to make that happen was a lot! Still, they participated in the results.
I think it’s like that with God. He could bat an eyelash and make things happen, but He will go to great lengths to involve us in the process, for our growth and good. Our prayers make a difference to Him. Here is what Eugene Peterson, the translator of The Message, points out as he explains the elusive “Middle Voice” in the Greek language.
“My grammar book said, ‘The middle voice is that use of the verb which describes the subjects participating in the results of the action. I read that now. And it reads like a description of Christian prayer—the subject is participating in the results of the action. I do not control the action; that is a pagan concept of prayer, putting the gods to work by my incantations or rituals. I am not controlled by the action; that is a Hindu concept of prayer in which I slump passively into the impersonal and fated will of the gods and goddesses. I enter into the action begun by another, my creating and saving Lord, and find myself participating in the results of the action. I neither do nor have done to me: I will participate in what is willed.’”
Reading this motivates me to pray, even more, to participate with the Almighty to bring about His will. What a privilege! He must love us an awful lot to include us in this process.
Thank you to all my friends and family who participated in the eternal by praying for my son in his recent surgery for a tumor removal from his neck. He is on the mend, and I am eternally grateful for your love & prayers for us.