This morning I was thinking about a situation I heard of a few months ago. One of my siblings friends is having a hard time in their marriage. In fact, it sounds like perhaps the husband is thinking of getting out all together. I was feeling burdened for this situation and was praying about it this morning and I found myself praying something that I wasn't sure if it was okay.
I was praying for the husband to feel convicted, to see what he's doing to his marriage and his wife, all of which I think was fine. But then I started praying that God would take his presence away from this man, that he would no longer sense God's pleasure with him until he turned in obedience. As soon as I prayed for God to remove his presence from him, I wondered if that is an okay thing for us to ask God to do to another person. I've thought on and off about it all day and haven't come to a conclusion one way or the other.
Thoughts? Advice?
In the Old Testament, God certainly does remove his presence from one person (e.g., Samson), even going so far as to transfer it to another person (e.g., from Saul to David). Surely, though, if this man is blatantly sinning, he would not have a true or reality-based sense of God's presence, would he? Really, it's just sad. Sad, sad, sad.
ReplyDeleteIt seems like if we approach our prayer life with the attitude, "What should I pray?" and after we've come up with a satisfactory answer to that we then proceed to pray, we will quickly snuff out our prayer life. But if we pray and ask honestly, we have the joy of the Father "telling" us that the thing we're asking for is not good. And so we are drawn closer to Him.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the feedback, Sarah and Ian. I am still wrestling with the issue, but I do know that I can pray for reconciliation!
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