We all get one - sometimes more than one.
I remember my first one. It was from my sister: Grandma had passed away. I could not do anything about it. I could not even go to the funeral.
I remember my second one. It was from my son. I was tired, had worked all day, and had just laid down the couch for a short nap.
“Hey, got a minute?”
I almost said, “No.” But I said, “Sure! What’s up?”
“Well, ya know I was over at Lee’s house buying his car, right? Um, well, I just wrecked the car. I’m in a field. Can you come get me?”
The fact that I was listening to his voice and not the EMT’s voice told me that he was fine. After he received the tickets for faulty brakes, etc, from the law enforcement officer, he was still fine: poorer financially, but richer in wisdom.
I could go get him but I could do nothing about the tickets and the resulting financial hardship and the fact that he had no vehicle.
Last night I received the third call. A friend is in serious physical hardship, beyond the capacity of the normal human. His ability to gain nourishment has ceased and yet the physical demands are still coming. Everything but two bites of food in the last three days has been vomited back up. Already underweight, life does not look pleasant now or in the near future. In my foggy, just-went-to-sleep brain, I struggled to know what to say. “Encourage” is the right answer, but how?
“Oh, that’s okay. You can just check out and the misery will stop.”
“Hey, everyone fails once in a while.”
But instead, I prayed with him, “God, you made his body and you know what’s happening. You can give strength and wisdom. You know what is best.”
So now we wait. We wait for God’s answer. It may come in three days, three weeks, or three months.
I cannot go to him. I cannot contact him. I cannot tell him all the promise-verses I read this morning. I can do nothing.
Is this not where He wants me, in the “I cannot” realm?
I cannot heal. But He can.
I cannot make the sunshine. But He can.
I cannot ease the pain. But He can.
I cannot change the circumstances. But He can.
I cannot. But He can.
Page 53 in The Battle Plan for Prayer (Stephen and Alex Kendrick) holds this comment about prayer: “But if the final [answer] is not what you hoped, you can trust that God’s Spirit will sustain you, and He is benevolent in His omniscience.”
While we wait for God’s final answer, I can trust that God’s Spirit will sustain my friend, and that God is benevolent in His omniscience.