{"id":283,"date":"2010-07-27T04:18:09","date_gmt":"2010-07-27T04:18:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/livingarguments.com\/?p=283"},"modified":"2010-07-27T04:18:51","modified_gmt":"2010-07-27T04:18:51","slug":"shattered-and-waiting-to-be-put-back-together","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/?p=283","title":{"rendered":"Shattered and waiting to be put back together"},"content":{"rendered":"

My mother’s side of the family had their family reunion this last weekend (July 23-25).\u00a0 We have many noticeable patterns for the Montgomery family reunion.\u00a0 We have a picnic on the first night, a banquet on the second night, and a worship service on the last day.\u00a0 This year the planning committee decided to make some pretty big changes.\u00a0 We moved the reunion from Manning, SC to Myrtle Beach.\u00a0 Since no family members lived in Myrtle Beach, we planned our own praise service for Sunday morning.\u00a0 The family asked me to speak.\u00a0 Ok…the planning committee asked my mother to find a speaker, and she asked me to speak.\u00a0 I decided to use the Gospel lesson from the lectionary for my message.\u00a0 It was Luke 11:1-13<\/a>.\u00a0 The passage deals with prayer, and one of my points dealt with persistence in prayer.\u00a0 In paraphrase, I said something along these lines.<\/p>\n

Why should we be persistent in prayer?\u00a0 God answers prayer….but that’s a simple answer.\u00a0 I’ve never been one to just accept the simple answer.\u00a0 Christians often fall into the trap of believing our life will be great just because we are Christians.\u00a0 We all know there will be times of suffering.\u00a0 There will be times in our suffering and despair where we will call out to the Lord and ask why he has turned away.\u00a0 Has God turned away?\u00a0 No!\u00a0 In those times where we feel like we’ve shattered and fallen, it’s God that reaches down and puts us back together.\u00a0 We must recognize that prayer is more than just a petition.\u00a0 It’s two way communication.\u00a0 We bring to God what is on our heart whether that is anger, hate and suffering or joy, thanksgiving and worship.\u00a0 And the spirit of God speaks to us and shows us those lesser burdens aren’t as heavy as we think and those back-breaking burdens are ones we don’t shoulder only.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That was Sunday morning.\u00a0 On Sunday afternoon I felt like I’d shattered and fallen.\u00a0 I left the reunion after midday and after a few stops got back to my home around 3:30pm.\u00a0 A mile before I got home my mother called me and asked me to pray.\u00a0 My cousin’s stepson had just been pulled out of the pool, and they were trying to revive him.\u00a0 My little brother was the one who grabbed him off the bottom of the pool and helped drag him onto the pool deck.\u00a0 I called my pastor, and she and others in my church community lifted their prayers too.\u00a0 At a little past 5pm, my mother called and said they weren’t able to revive him.\u00a0 I didn’t want to be alone at that time so I went to the late service at my church and some church members talked and prayed with me, and I cried.<\/p>\n

Monday was a day completely filled with uncertainty.\u00a0 My cousin, my aunt and their family began the long drive back to New Jersey to begin planning a funeral.\u00a0 We don’t know what the plans will be or when they’ll take place.\u00a0 My mom is still trying to decide whether to travel and spend time with her sister.\u00a0 My parents and I are naturally worried for my little brother.\u00a0 It’s tough enough being a twelve year old.\u00a0 It’s even harder being a twelve year old and having your eyes opened in such a rough manner to the unfairness of the world.<\/p>\n

Even amongst all the pain, I’m thankful for everyone who has reached out to my family in their time of bereavement.\u00a0 I ask that you continue to pray for us, and extend your prayers to all three families who are grieving.<\/p>\n

Oh Lord, give us strength.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My mother’s side of the family had their family reunion this last weekend (July 23-25).\u00a0 We have many noticeable patterns for the Montgomery family reunion.\u00a0 We have a picnic on the first night, a banquet on the second night, and a worship service on the last day.\u00a0 This year the planning committee decided to make […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-z-general","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=283"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":288,"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions\/288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/livingarguments.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}