Advent 2 Monday - Your Prayer Has Been Heard

Two significant people in the Christmas story – and certainly in the pre-Christmas story – are the priest Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth.  You can read their story in Luke 1. 

They were both elderly and had prayed for a child all their lives.  Now both were past the age where they might expect to conceive and bear a child.  But one day while Zechariah is performing his duties in the temple an angel appears to him with this message:

The angel said to him: “Do not be afraid, Zechariah; your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you are to call him John.  Luke 1:13

I won’t go into all the details of the story but Elizabeth and Zechariah had prayed all their lives to have a baby and nothing had happened. 

Now God is telling them that when they are old they will?  Hard to trust but trust they did

and God was true to His word and Elizabeth did conceive and give birth to a son whom they named John and he became the famous John the Baptist.

“Your prayer has been heard.”  Are there lovelier words than those? I often stop in amazement when I think that the God who created the earth, and even the vastness of space is paying attention to what you and I have to say on any given day, standing ready to act.  It’s pretty mind-bogglingly amazing.

When we do pray to Him and then feel pressured because we assume our prayers have not been heard because we haven’t yet seen the result we asked for,

it’s good to remember that our job too is to pray and trust. Just like with Elizabeth and Zechariah, God, is in control and doing things in the right way and the right time.

Heavenly Father, in the Bible we read,

Because He has inclined His ear to me, therefore I shall call upon Him as long as I live.  Psalm 116:2

So we will call on You today because You are the God who hears and answers prayer.  We put our trust in You.  You are listening.  You are responding to every single prayer we send up to you. 

We end these moments together with these comforting and reassuring words – so familiar and yet so powerful:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.  Proverbs 3:5-6

Amen