Often when friends post things they are going through on social media: health issues, bereavement or tough times, it receives an outpouring of love. Encouraging or sympathetic messages from concerned friends, who then finish their comment by leaving the prayer hands emoji. I always wonder what prayer they would pray, what would that sound like? do they pray? or is throwing up the prayer hands emoji something we do as the default symbol for compassion? I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, but does praying even work?
When I was nine I fell off the top of the climbing frame at school. On the way down I hit a bar with my mouth, which smashed two of my front teeth out and damaged several others. They capped and straightened all the chipped teeth and managed to save one front tooth but lost the other. I had to have a denture made, and as I grew older I had countless dentures made to compensate for growth. As I moved into my twenties and I needed replacements I had to cover the expense myself, as it was costly I couldn’t afford to replace it so I went without and had a gaping hole at the front. Smiles were few and far between.
Later on in life when I gave my life to Christ and became a Christian I slowly began to apply the lifestyle changes. Eventually, my attention turned to my missing tooth. I remember talking to God saying, “If what you say in this book (Bible) is true and what I feel inside is genuine,” then I want an experience of you that’s solely mine. And so I began to pray, pray that God would fix my missing tooth. I prayed not Our Father’s, not Hail Mary’s just simple conversations. Prayers that sound like this, well Lord if you can raise Lazarus from the dead like in the Bible, then you can fix my tooth. At times I would apply words from the Bible to give it more kick, apparently, that’s what you did. I would lay my hands on myself look in the mirror and yell, ‘Lazarus come forth!’ I would wait for something to happen…but nothing.
I kept it to myself, I wasn’t sure calling out God was a good idea. But I didn’t want any inference. I wanted something real that only he and I knew about. For several years I persisted with my quest, not hours, days or months, but years. One Sunday morning as I'm showering and getting ready for church, an audible conscious thought spoke “I’m going to fix your tooth today!” I paused, I listened, and nothing else happened, did I just hear that? Or again was it just wishful thinking?, after all, I had spent several years in pursuit of a touch from this God. There was no denying that what Id heard was distinctly different and I have never experienced anything similar since.
I went to church hopeful, all right God I said, lay it on me fix my tooth, nothing I sang with more enthusiasm, clapped louder than anybody else and paid more attention to the words being spoken. The service drew to a close and still no tooth. Everyone began to file out of the building, I thought, maybe God wants me to stay back. I hung around awkwardly while the musicians packed up, and still, nothing happened. Ahh well I thought, a little disappointed I turned and left the building.
As I reached the bottom of the stairs about to exit a woman’s head popped around the corner and startled me. I knew the face as she and her family were regular attendees we had never held a conversation outside of the standard good morning or a smile in passing.
“Hi Simon,” she said, she reached out and placed a business card in my hand. “My dad is an Orthodontist, he wants to fix your tooth she continued, just give him a call this week to organise a time to book an appointment. She smiled turned and walked away. You think after years of expectation I would have some kind of reaction. I just stood there speechless and watched her walk away.
Undeniably God, was I expecting something different?, to be honest, I hadn’t thought that far. I had bridgework done to replace the missing tooth, I had a deep teeth clean and repairs done, solid foundational work to reinstate a beautiful smile, and I didn’t pay a cent, God foots the bill.
There are countless stories of people with similar experiences, some immediate some drawn out like mine. Im not saying prayer is like a magic wand that we can wave over situations to make them disappear, sometimes things just have to be walked. For me, It was never about a missing tooth. I simply wanted an experience of God that was solely mine, and I know prayer can be so much more than just an emoji.
Matt 18:20 For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am amidst them…