Last night I had a really incredible experience. We had a student leader's crawfish boil - the crawfish part was not the incredible experience, personally I thought that was a little creepy but all of my Louisiana friends seem to think it's the thing to do! After all of the little critters were consumed, we spent some time talking about the fall semester and then in prayer. My friend Truman led the prayer time. Truman has really been learning a lot about listening to God in prayer, so he led us through a time where we listened. I have to admit, I felt uncomfortable. It wasn't the awkward pauses or the occasional sniffle that made me feel uncomfortable, it was my own fear - I really want to hear God in prayer, but what if he doesn't show up? What if I can't hear his voice or he doesn't have anything to say to me? All of those thoughts were swirling around in my head every time I paused to listen. I did feel like the Lord was saying a few things to me - one thing in particular when Truman asked us to ask God to bring to mind a friend and then to pray for them. I was really convicted of a relationship in my life that is not as it should be right now....but I kept thinking, is this just from me or is it from the Lord? I went back and forth, asking that question until we had our sharing time....

One of our students, Willy, shared that the person God put on his heart was his brother....with deep emotion he told that he's scarred to share with his brother, scarred of the rejection he may face. It was very touching. As soon as he finished sharing another girl excitedly burst out, "the person that God on my heart was Willy! I didn't know why but now it makes sense!". So we started to pray for Willy and his brother. This gal opened us in prayer. One of the things she prayed was, "Lord, open the eyes of his heart". Well then Truman prayed and he revealed that in his time of listening God had impressed him with the song "Open the eyes of my heart". It was an amazing experience! God was doing something in our group to show Willy that he was taking care of him, loving his brother more than any of us ever could. It was a divine moment.

I immediately left went home to contact the friend who I needed to make things right with - delayed obedience is disobedience - that was Truman's closing line.

I've been thinking about last night all day....about how God is orchestrating all of our lives. About how he connects us in a community - he does things that causes us to be in each other's lives - our prayers were intertwined last night not because of what we were saying, but because of what we were hearing from the Lord. I need to be a better listener, it's my pride, my fear, my business and my selfishness that keep me from listening. It's my lack of willingness to radically obey, to step out in faith even when things don't make sense. My great desire is that I really would make space in my life for the divine. That really would invite him into every moment of every day believing that he will show up, that he has something greater for me than the life I try to so desperately to control.

In the 8 years that I've worked for this organization, I've never had a time of prayer where we listened to God. Don't get me wrong, I know that the men and women in our organization love God and really seek him. Lately it feels like all we do is try to solve problems and we're not succeeding. The time of prayer made me begin to wonder, "do we just start at the wrong place?" We are a competent group of people, we can "do" ministry - we have great stradegies, but are these stradegies going to be enough? I don't think so. I wonder what would happen if we paused to listen to God - to really find out where he is leading us. I have to first look to my own ministry in this. I spend a lot of time telling God what I would like to see happen - giving him my definition of success. I wonder if he has something greater for me and I miss it because I'm not listening. To see how clearly he was at work in 40 minutes in our time of listening to him, makes me wonder what my ministry would look like day to day if I took that time. I really believe I might start to see those things that only God can do happen here in New Orleans. I want that! I want all that God has for us as a ministry.