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September 2005

Unanswered Prayers?

My first Charismatic retreat was back in April of 1996. My place was booked by a close friend's mother who wanted my friend to do the retreat & thought I'd be good company for her!

As God would have it, I was touched and she wasn't.

Over the years my friend and I have continued to be very close. During this time I not only prayed for her continuously, I also took her for many retreats at various different retreat centers in and out of Mumbai. Nothing seemed to work.

In the worldly sense, there was nothing wrong with my friend - but I could always see in her deep inner wounds, unforgiveness and hurts. I knew that in order for her to be truly happy she needed an experience of the Lord - as do all of us.

As time progressed, my friend's wounds deepened. Being let down & hurt by people closest to her when she needed them the most or by people whom she counted on for support - she became more and more outwardly hard - and inwardly insecure. Small problems became increasingly harder and harder to deal with and she often ran away from conflict and sometimes from reality itself.

About three weeks ago she came to spend a few nights in my home. I used the time to talk to her as I usually did about God and how she needed to do, if possible, an Inner Healing retreat. She was in a bad way at the time and surprisingly said she would possibly do one (usually she would shoot down any such suggestion in the air).

Inner Healing Retreats however are not held continuously (unlike the Initiation retreats at Potta & Tabor which are held every week of the year) so I told her I'd have to find out when the next one was - and I sincerely hoped she would have the time to attend.

The next day, quite by 'coincidence' (I put this in inverted commas, because I believe there are no coincidences in the Lord) I spoke to a friend of mine who told me she was doing an Inner Healing retreat that very weekend. Overjoyed, I spoke to the organizers who very kindly let her in even though at the eleventh hour!

Over the next few days I prayed and prayed for her & the other friend who were doing the retreat. I also daily offered Mass for them both.

There were times I thought of the many past retreats my friend had attended, where by her own words she had "packed bags & come and then packed bags and left" but I would push those thoughts out of my head and say "God, You are the God of the Impossible. Make this happen, please ."

When she finally finished the retreat, she called me up. I was so nervous it was almost funny! I asked her how it was. And you can just imagine my pain when she said -

"I wasn't touched or anything."

I was so disappointed but I closed my eyes on the other side of the phone and praised the Lord in my mind. You know what's best I told him. I know you know what's best.

Nevertheless, I called her to spend the night & tell me more. When she arrived she started telling me all about the retreat. How she was able to forgive so many people after so many years. How she was able to remember then seemingly insignificant details about her childhood which had caused her deep hurts & bondages.

She went on and on. I listened, half in tears, all the while just being amazed at our wonderful God! This here was the same person who would have earlier shut me up with an F or a B if I even started talking about the Lord!

I stopped her and asked her why she told me she wasn't touched when she had obviously had such a powerful experience that she could talk about it for hours (it was close to 2 in the morning when I asked her). She seemed quite surprised at what I said.

"But I didn't feel anything" she told me, "No electricity or anything like that"

I was so happy I could have hit her on the head!!!

"You dolt" I said, "You won't necessarily have a physical experience - it's the spiritual experience that counts".

She still wasn't convinced.

"Well" I reasoned with her, "5 days ago, would you even let me talk to you about the Lord for this long, let alone YOU talking about Him? And do you really think you were able to forgive all these people on your own? Or that you've remembered so much about the past by yourself?"

She slowly started taking it all in. And she realized that she really wasn't the same person she had been a few days earlier.

Today it's not like she has been completely transformed. She is in spiritual counseling and can see a long road ahead of her. But she's happy that at the very least she's started the journey... and with Jesus by her side, it's sure to be a glorious and good one!

It's so often that we pray & pray for people and it seems like God isn't answering our prayers. We tend to give up or feel discouraged and deem the person or cause to be "Hopeless". In God's eyes there is no hopeless. There is no impossible. There is only perfect timing.

And in God's perfect timing, the hopelessly impossibly will be made possible.

The key is to never give up. Like the widow and the unjust judge (Luke 18), we must persevere in our prayers. No prayers for the salvation of another being are ever unanswered.

God bless you & your loved ones,

Melody
September 2005

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