Jon Acuff's Blog, page 59

8 Uncomfortable Prayer Moments

(It’s guest post Friday! This one is from Robyn Adams. For more great writing from her, check out her Living the Simple Life Now. If you’d like to write one too, submit it here.)

Prayer meetings are a great thing! My husband has been in the ministry for 12 years and I have been to many of them. Most turn out great. They are a meaningful time spent with God. Prayers shared among believers. Bonds are created. What could be better at church?

But, there are those moments when things get a little uncomfortable. What started out with good intentions has somehow turned “awkward.” There are many ways this can happen. Here are 8 of my “favorite” just plain “weird” prayer moments I’ve experienced as a pastor’s wife.

1.) When 2 people start praying at the same time and both stop, neither sure if they should start again. (Insert uncomfortable silence.) Who should start again? It’s always a mystery.

2.) There are those moments that start out innocently enough. But then someone gives a prayer request, only to reveal a piece of juicy gossip while doing so. The “victim” is typically not present. You hear a few gasps from the prayer group. The next time you see the “victim,” you are unsure how to react or what to say to them. Do you mention it and say you are praying for them? Do you warn them that the entire prayer group knows their “secret.” There are no easy answers here.

3.) Sometimes a prayer request turns into a “lack of humility” moment for the prayer. I don’t think it’s intentional. They just get caught up in the moment. We were once in a church service we attended regularly and the lady praying thanked God that our church was “the friendliest church in town.” First, it wasn’t true, the church was notorious for not welcoming visitors. Second, it’s as if you are calling yourself “humble.” It’s not really something you say about yourself.

It’s like Numbers 12:3 where it says, “Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.” While Moses is the accepted author of Numbers, we can be pretty confident that Moses didn’t pen that part, right?

4.) There are also those moments when a prayer request turns into a sermon. A very long sermon. I’ve never figured out how to handle these. Since my husband is the pastor and typically gives the sermons, I can’t figure out if these people just have something to get off their chests or have “job envy.” Maybe a little of both?

5.) Nothing is more humiliating than when you are called on to pray and you can’t remember a single prayer request just given. It’s time for a “blanket prayer” and hope no one notices!

6.) There are also those times when someone gives a prayer request for themselves for an upcoming surgery or other medical procedure that involves a part of the body that should probably be left unmentioned in a prayer meeting. We’ve been a part of several older congregations and prayed for more than our fair share of prostate problems!

7.) There’s one in every congregation. They are the “quiet prayer.” This often leaves you forced to “peek” to see if the prayer is over. It’s never easy to determine when and if the time is appropriate. You don’t want to be the one still standing in prayer when everyone is moving about their business. But you also don’t want to be seen with your eyes open during prayer by another “peeker” and look less spiritual.

8.) When a prayer is so long  you start to doze off. Then you must determine what to do to keep yourself awake without disturbing your neighbor. Or, even worse, letting them know you are having trouble staying awake!

I’ve been present when someone gives a prayer request that belongs more in a confessional than in an open prayer meeting. Once the person sitting next to me requested, “Please pray that I will stop shop lifting.” I wasn’t quite sure what to say to that person after prayer time. So I did the next best thing: I gave them a hug!

Prayer meetings are a great thing! But there are those moments, if you’ve been to many prayer meetings, that can get a little “uncomfortable.” When these happen, just chuckle to yourself. (Really, I’m serious, just do it to yourself!) I’m pretty sure God is grinning during some of them, too!

Have you ever had an uncomfortable prayer moment?

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Google Juke!

Oh, you use Google? I use the Alpha and Omega. Whaevs.

(I know God is all knowing, but tomorrow, instead of using Google, try just asking God for the Williamson County Rec Center hours and telephone number. Let me know how that works out you jukester.)

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The word that holds us back.

There is nothing special about January 1.

As a day, it’s not really different than any other day.

It holds no special power or ability that other days do not possess.

And yet, it tends to be the day of the year we all dare to try new things. We launch adventures, set resolutions and hope for something different this year. I do the same thing and over the years I’ve learned a lot about what holds me back from actually doing something.

More than anything, I struggle with the fear of regret.

What if I make a decision and I regret it?

What if I choose the wrong thing and I regret it?

What if things don’t turn out the right way and I regret it?

Fictional regret often cripples us from factual action.

Future regret paralyzes our present.

But here’s something I feel like God asked me once when it comes to regret:

“Am I not more powerful than regret?”

That’s a simple question, but at the heart of it is a problem. When you are afraid you might make a mistake you act as if God is not in the business of redeeming mistakes. You act as if you could make a mistake he could not handle. You act as if God is smaller than your mistakes.

He’s not. He’s awful big.

Bigger than mistakes.

Bigger than failure.

And yes, bigger than regret.

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Praying your kids don’t have another snow day.

(This is a guest post from @JennyAcuff.)

I don’t guest post a lot on Jon’s blogs. (I have a different dream I’m working on right now.)

But occasionally I do, and in this particular case, I need to make a confession.

As I write this, our school district has not announced whether our kids will go to school today (Tuesday). Other counties have. Other districts are closed to Wednesday. Do you know why ours is still open?

The power of prayer.

Specifically mine.

I know, I know, I’m a horrible mom. But hear me out for a second.

We are on day 15 of Christmas vacation. We have spent hours and hours in the same car driving about the Southeast. We are arguing about anything that dares make eye contact with us. We are now at the stage of parenting called “I love my kids, but I’d like them to go to school for a few hours.” Not forever, just a day or two. If they want to cancel school on Friday, go for it. The Acuffs will be back in the swing of things by then.

But as for now, I will hold my prayer vigil that our school district has the fortitude to buck the trend of snow days.

Put a scarf on them. Make them a peanut butter sandwich and release the children back into school!

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Amazing Lord of the Rings & Muppets mashup.

I have a board on Pinterest called “Tom Bombadil’s Fridge.” If you are a dork like me, you will immediately get the reference and should follow it immediately. This is the kind of stuff I pin. I don’t know who created it, but well done!

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How to prank a Christian.

A friend sent me this photo. I like that one kid got the Biblical name, “Luke” and the other kid got “TJ.” That T better stand for “Titus” and the J for “Judah,” instead of the parents just being huge “TJ Hooker” fans. I digress.

What’s important is that I think it represents a brilliant prank opportunity.

How awesome would it be to get a bunch of Jesus stick figure stickers and then secretly place them on every stick figure family at church?

One by one, each Sunday morning as you walk into church, just quietly place stick figure Jesus onto the back of unsuspecting cars. I wouldn’t do this to complete strangers at the mall because that would kind of be like a Jesus sneak attack.

The funny part would be seeing how long it took people to notice and if they would remove it when they did. I think if you’re a Christian you can’t remove a Jesus sticker. That’s in the Bible somewhere. Google it up.

And then, once you’ve done that to all your friends, you start to add accessories. Like a whip for overturning the temple or a tiny little wave so he could walk on water. I’m just spitballing here people.

My question to you is, do you have a stick figure family on your car? If so, is there room for Jesus in your heart (and your rear windshield)?

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Thinking you’re naked.

I don’t want to brag, but I’m pretty awesome at applying band-aids. And make no mistake, that is an art. Because if you go too quickly and unpeel them the wrong way, they stick to themselves and you end up with a wadded up useless mess, instead of the Little Mermaid festooned bandage your daughter so desperately wants to apply to a boo boo that may in fact be 100% fictional.

Half of the injuries I treat at the Acuff house are invisible or simply wounds of sympathy. My oldest daughter will scrape her knee, and my younger daugther, realizing the band aid box is open will say, “Yo dad, I’d like to get in on that too. What do you say we put one on, I don’t know, my ankle. Yeah, my ankle, let’s pretend that’s hurt.”

But sometimes the cuts are real, like the day a few years ago when my then 5-year old got a scrape on her face playing in the front yard. I rushed in the house and returned with a princess bandage. As I bent down to apply it to her forehead, her eyes filled up with tears and she shrunk back from me.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“I don’t want to wear that band-aid.” She replied.

“Why? You have a cut. You need a band-aid.” I said.

“I’ll look silly,” she answered.

Other than her sister and her mom, there was no one else in the yard. None of her friends were over, cars were not streaming by our house and watching us play, the world was pretty empty at that moment. But, for the first time I can remember, she felt shame. She had discovered shame. Somewhere, somehow, this little 5-year-old had learned to be afraid of looking silly. If I was smarter, if I had been better prepared for the transition from little toddler to little girl, I might have asked her this:

“Who told you that you were silly?”

I didn’t, though. That question didn’t bloom in my head until much later, and I didn’t understand it until I saw God ask a similar question in Genesis 3:11. To me, this is one of the saddest and most profoundly beautiful verses in the entire Bible. Adam and Eve have fallen. The apple is a core. The snake has spoken. The dream appears crushed. As they hide from God under clothes they’ve hastily sewn together, He appears and asks them a simple question:

“Who told you that you were naked?”

There is hurt in God’s voice as He asks this question, but there is also a deep sadness, the sense of a father holding a daughter that has for the first time ever, wrapped herself in shame.

Who told you that you were not enough?

Who told you that I didn’t love you?

Who told you that there was something outside of me you needed?

Who told you that you were ugly?

Who told you that your dream was foolish?

Who told you that you would never have a child?

Who told you that you would never be a father?

Who told you that you weren’t a good mother?

Who told you that without a job you aren’t worth anything?

Who told you that you’ll never know love again?

Who told you that this was all there is?

Who told you that you were naked?

I don’t know when you discovered shame. I don’t know when you discovered that there were people who might think you are silly or dumb or not a good writer or a husband or a friend. I don’t know what lies you’ve been told by other people or maybe even by yourself.

But in response to what you are hearing from everyone else, God is still asking the question, “Who told you that you were naked?”

And He’s still asking us that question because we are not.

In Christ, we are not worthless.

In Christ, we are not hopeless.

In Christ, we are not dumb or ugly or forgotten.

In Christ, we are not naked.

Isaiah 61:10 says:

“For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness.”

The world may try to tell you a thousand different things today. You might close this post and hear a million declarations of who you are or who you’ll always be, but know this:

As unbelievable as it sounds, and as much as I never expected to type this sentence on this blog:

You are not naked.

(This is a throw back post that originally appeared on SCL a few years ago.) 

- See more at: http://stuffchristianslike.net/2012/0...

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This is how I want to live my life.

Behold the power of delight.

Of doing something unexpected for someone most people don’t even see.

It’s a late addition, but this might be my favorite thing from 2013.

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33 Fantastical Christian Resolutions!

The new year is upon us.

And with it, new resolutions!

This year, I thought I would help you out by creating:

33 Fantastical Christian Resolutions!

You will not use “love on” as a verb.
You will try your best to ignore typos in the worship music.
You will admit that God probably uses a Mac.
You will wear less skinny jeans, the pockets of which you could not get a tic tac into if you had a crowbar.
You will stop using “Just sayin’” as a “get out of jerk” free card.
You will never, ever interlink digits with a stranger at church if the pastor asks everyone to hold hands in prayer. You’re not at a roller rink doing the couple’s skate to “Tender Roni.”
You will not make married people who don’t have kids feel like they have to have babies tomorrow.
You will not fall in love on a mission trip.
You will admit you sometimes play Candy Crush when you are supposed to be looking up Bible verses on your iPhone during church.
You will drive nicer on the way to church or at least remove your little metal Jesus fish so you can drive like a maniac in the church parking lot once the sermon is over.
You will wonder what Tim Tebow is up to these days.
You will not look down on Vacation Bible Schools that don’t have “bounce houses” or “inflatables.”
You will stop buying bootleg cookies, I’m looking at your Hydrox, for Sunday School.
You will agree that we need to stop having super lame jokes about sex during our weddings.
You will never ask the fat content of a meal cooked from heaven’s favorite dish, the crock pot.
You will not use “let me pray about that” as a synonym for “no” when someone asks you for a favor.
You will forever stop using the comic sans font.
You will watch the movie version of “Heaven is for Real” or enjoy your fold out couch bed in Hades.
Your church will hold super awkward events for single adults.
You will stop assuming your sound guy/girl must hate sweet baby Jesus because one of the mics didn’t work right.
You will understand how metrosexual your worship leader is.
You will go on a digital fast without announcing it to the whole world or pretending the God of the universe spoke to you because you gave up Twitter for 72 hours.
You will not skip church when you realize that today is a guest speaker.
You will not judge people who smoke cigars, as they are considered the “Christian cigarette.”
You will stop creating tracts that look like fake money because Jesus never created “fake drachmas.”
You will feel a little bit guilty about not homeschooling your kids if you have any.
You will take as many things as you can from “the head to the heart.”
You will not feel guilty if you don’t want to raise your hands while singing.
You will wonder if the guy next to you is going to share gum at church now that you’ve seen it.
You will have an epic fight with your spouse on the way to church.
You will not use the hashtag “#Blessed” for things God might not have been involved in. “Just got tickets to Justin Timberlake! #Blessed”
You will not Jesus Juke.
You will attend at least one church with a name that sounds like it is a designer clothing store.

Those are my resolutions this year.

What is your Christian resolution?

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Ever feel like the worst parent?

This should make you feel better.

I’ve always heard that it’s good to get between a baby bear and it’s mama.

And if you happen to, the first thing you want to do is put that bear on your baby.

Please caption this photo! (Photo via @Historyinpics)

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