-James Banks- "Our family struggled with that question in a heart-rending way. Though our daughter received Jesus when she was a small child, with adolescence came a gathering storm of rebellion and trouble at home.
In spite of our best efforts, the world, the influence of friends without faith, and her own choices gradually took their toll. The distance between us and the daughter we dearly loved became so great that one day she simply walked away. (Google image, Man and woman praying)
When my wife told me the news, the urgency in her voice reached through the cell phone and grabbed me by the throat. "She's gone." she said, choking back tears. "Katie's gone."
What do you mean, gone?" I asked. "What happened? Where did she go?"
What followed was every parent's nightmare. Through some reported sightings, we knew Katie was out somewhere on the streets in our city, known for its violent crime and drug abuse.
We scoured the city looking for her. Police and sheriff's departments were notified, parents and friends alerted, reports filed, and Katie's name and picture circulated to law enforcement agencies throughout the state and country. Members of our church joined in the search, sending Katie's name out on prayer chains. Out late at night and up early in the morning, we followed every clue we could find.
The sleepless nights and long hours of worry took their toll. Days stretched into weeks. Like any passionate mother, Cari was so consumed with finding her daughter that she was teetering on the edge.
One day, she called me from an armed drug dealer's apartment where she had gone alone, trying to find out anything she could about Katie. The minutes in the car as I made my way there through traffic were the longest of my life.
After that, I told Cari we needed to be less frantic and spend more time praying. Her response was, "I pray while I am looking." But something didn't feel right. No matter how hard we looked or how hard we prayed while we were looking, it led nowhere.
By now, Katie had been gone for more than three weeks. One night one of our son's friends who was helping us look for her saw her at a convenience store. She was hanging out with a girl who had been a runaway for months and a young man newly released from jail. The store clerk told us they had asked about bus tickets out of state.
For the next twenty-four hours we hardly slept. I sent fliers to every bus terminal in the area. I sat outside the bus station, watching and waiting. We did everything we could think of. Only then did we begin to realize that this was just too much, more than we could handle on our own.
The truth had finally sunk in. God alone knew exactly where she was, and He could help us find her better than anyone else.
In the end, that's how it happened. The next Sunday, difficult as it was, we took a step back from our frantic search. It was Father's Day. We spent some time with our son that afternoon and made a special effort to pray together for Katie.
That evening I took Cari out to dinner in a nearby town. We heard Katie had been seen there, and we thought that we might even run into her. But when we arrived, we discovered the restaurants were already closed for the day. So we started back home.
The the phone rang. It was a waitress at a diner we liked to visit just two blocks away. Katie was there. God led us directly to where she was. Within two minutes, we were standing in front of her. With a lot of love and hard work, Katie was soon on the road to recovery at home. And Cari and I discovered the difference praying can make.
[Taken from a booklet, PRAYER CHANGES THINGS, of Our Daily Bread Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. www.odb.org]
Father, our story today is a good example of how some try so hard to figure out things themselves, neglecting to involve You when they're frantically trying to figure out their dilemma by themselves.
Today's Bible verses-
~ With life's details looming ahead, do we take some time to consider where our path is taking us? Do we take into consideration where we've come, and where we're going? Is there a plan to let go of the past and to embrace the future? Let's trust it all to God, that all will be fine under His direction.
Today's popular post:
The North Country Christian Fellowship Center Churches,
located in the St. Lawrence county of NY,
broadcast their Sunday services at 10 or 10:15
You can view past services too.
Sermon listing: https://www.
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