Either way

     God has been working in my heart with some serious questions lately… questions like “what if I pray and the money doesn’t come?” “What if I pray and that person isn’t healed, what if instead they die?” “What if the worst conceivable thing in mind and heart does in fact come to pass, is God still God?”  I have a lot of friends, and friends of friends, going through heartache.  I am no stranger to this, nor do I believe that I am somehow exempt from experiencing it again.  And I have been praying, fervently praying, for some serious miracles to happen.  But then I hear God in my heart, “What if I choose not to?” Let me tell you, that messes with me.  That messes with my picture of what I think God should do.  But let’s go there for a moment.  
     What if He doesn’t do the things that we think He should, the things we have been on our faces praying for? What if that child never comes to know the Lord? What if that addiction is never healed?  What if we do lose our jobs?  What if, like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, we find ourselves being thrown into a fiery furnace?  I have the faith that I know my God can save me, I know he can heal, I know he can provide, but what if He simply chooses not to?  When God posed that question in my heart I began to pray, I pray for a willing heart to respond as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego responded to the furnace in Daniel 3:17-18 “Our God, whom we serve, is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of your hand, O king.  But if not, be it known to you O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.” 
     But if not, in other words either way, I will serve my God.  Either way I will follow Him, I will follow Yahweh.  Even if it means through the fire and pits, even if I stand alone, even if I cry out in agony and fear, I will serve my God.

 Lord God, solidify this deep in my heart so that when the storms of this world come, when the situation looks bleak, I will trust in You alone.  Make this my hearts cry in the moments of pain and affliction, in moments of impossibility; give me this faith to follow You! Either way Lord, either way!