Faith and Prayer

This is going to be one of two posts on prayer and faith, both are connected but different in a way. I’ve been thinking a lot about prayer, I used to view prayer as a combination of two things, one where I ask God for things He can either do for me or give me, and two I basically talk. Over the past few weeks, and I guess you could say months my view has changed and here are two factors in this change. A while ago I had a dog named Daisy, she was a sweet, beautiful dog, no other dog can compare to her, she loved to paw us when she wanted something, she would eat food off of the counter, she sat on the furniture, she never left your side, and she never, ever got mad at anyone. But in 2006 something very sad happened, she died of cancer, a battle she faced all her life. While we had Daisy we also had Dutch or first dog, he is great too, when he was younger he would play with us but now serves as our protector. But then near the start of the summer he got cancer. I prayed a lot for Daisy and seemingly nothing ever happened, sadly I did not pray as earnestly for Dutch, I admit I thought nothing would happen to him either, I went to Oregon for a week and we were planning to put him down before we left, then it would be just us an Rosy. But then a miracle happened, a family friend took him in, they loved him and kept him alive so that he is here with us today as I write this post and will hopefully be with us until his 8th birthday on August 8th. The fact is that I did pray and God answered my prayers and I thought to myself, it doesn’t matter whether I pray 1 time or 100 times, I had the faith to pray and to call on to God for help and He didn’t disappoint. I felt foolish because I thought I had lost faith and while I did not approach Dutch’s illness with the certainty I had shown during Daisy’s sickness, he is still with us and that is all that really matters, perhaps next time I get an opportunity to pray for someone or something I will be if not more certain, I will be more faithful.