By Deacon Gregory M. Kirk
St. Joseph Catholic Church
“If you’ll leave your phone with us for an hour, our technician may be able to fix it. If it can’t be fixed, for a fee of $50.00, we’ll send out for a replacement. You should have it by Wednesday or Thursday.”
I mumbled my thanks, leaving my phone with the associate at the cell phone store, and made my way to the car.
Opening the car door, I considered how to spend the next sixty minutes. Then, the realization hit me – I had no contact with the outside world! I couldn’t make or receive calls from family members for the next hour, maybe not for the next four days. I thought of the many contacts I regularly speak to as a bank officer, and as a Christian minister.
This must be how Wyatt Earp felt without his Colt revolver! How did I become so “hooked” on being armed with a phone clipped to my belt?
For most of my life, being away from home and needing to make a phone call meant finding a pay phone booth. My life was fine without a cell phone. Then the question dawned on me, how does a person who values love of God and love of people over material things become so dependant on a “thing?”
The thought of being without my phone for a few days led to a short prayer – “please let my phone be ready and working when I return to the store!”
I fastened my seat belt and placed the key in the ignition. The engine turned over. Then I turned it off. I was reminded of a great spiritual insight, and I needed some time to reflect – God always hears me!
I later learned that my cell phone was working fine. The carrier I have my cell phone service with was repositioning their tower in the Galion area. Consequently, calls were being dropped. My little prayer had been answered.
All the way home to Galion, I thought about God’s availability to His people. When we call God, our calls are never dropped.
The words of the prophet Isaiah rang in my heart, “Before they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.” (Isaiah 65:24)
The Bible’s message is consistent from Genesis to Revelation – God created human beings in His image and likeness, because He loves us. He wants to be in a relationship of love with us, a relationship that lasts forever.
Relationships are forged, and sustained, by communication. God wants us to speak to Him, about everything that concerns or matters to us. Nothing is too small to bring to His attention. And God wants us to listen, for the loving reassurance of His presence and care.
As I thought about cell phones and cell phone towers on the way home, I smiled, knowing that technology is not required to call God. God can be called anywhere, anytime, in any season or circumstance. The only thing we need to reach him is humility.
There are many ways to pray, as many ways probably as there are people. And yet prayer in its essence is simply talking with God, like we would talk to another person. Then waiting to hear back. Waiting to hear back from Someone who loves us unconditionally, a Someone who looks at us, in our brokenness and sinfulness, through the wounds and scars on His Son’s arms, feet, and side, and recognizes us as His “beloved.”
In seasons of success and failure, victory and temporary loss, joy and sadness, God wants us to experience His abiding love. He wants to free us from tension and worry, and enable us to live in an uncertain and changing world, with confidence, peace and hope. He wants to be the center of our lives, and He wants us to find our identity and meaning in Him – the only place they can be found.
When we talk to God regularly, we begin to discover more fully who we really are, find our purpose in life, and learn what leads to happiness and peace. Prayer also enables us to grow in understanding Who God is. Calling God helps move us from believing in God to “knowing” Him.
Talk to Him daily, in every season and situation. Prayer won’t give us problem free lives, or enable us to live without challenge at times. After all, even Jesus experienced pain, grief, suffering and death. But in a growing relationship with God, we find the strength and grace to move forward, to press on, to overcome, and to live with peace in a fractured world.
As I pulled into my driveway, returning home from the cell phone store, I determined to call God more often, and to strive to be a better listener, anticipating His love and care.
New and abundant life is just a call away. The best news ever is that there is no monthly charge on the calling plan. And the plan benefits are literally out of this world!