When You Want to Quit….Remember.

By:  Diane Nix

Remember.   I want to remember her face, her smile, her hair, her eyes.  Her eyes are burned into my memory.  I wish I had taken a picture of her, but I didn’t.   I wasn’t taking many pictures that day.  I was praying.  I was laying hands on the sick – the hundreds of sick that had come that day.  I hadn’t stopped except to wipe the sweat.  The mandate of the Lord was to kneel before them, touch them, and pray boldly.  Admittedly, the first two or three times I had boldly prayed I had become overwhelmed with what I was hearing in my spirit.  I pulled back around the corner.  My interpreter followed me closely, asking, “Mama Diane, are you sick?”  No, I was not physically sick but I felt the oppression heavily and then what I was hearing in my head was so loud that I had pulled back. I said that I needed a moment….a moment to gather myself and I would come around.  I put my back as best I could to the crowd, hundreds of Ghananians had come to the clinic.  Closed my eyes and prayed, “God am I hearing from you or am I just making up what I’m hearing in my head?  If this is You…Your are so loud.”  I heard, “Trust Me.  Pray Boldly!” And so I did.

Now…..moments later…here I was kneeling before a very aged woman.  I held in my hand her intake form and as I read it, my eyes locked on her age.  I looked at the interpreter and asked for her to confirm that it was correct.  She confirmed the age and I turned back to the woman and asked, “How did you get here today?”  She said, “They carried me most of the way.”  The intake form stated that she was 112 years old.  For the next few moments, I felt as if I were in slow motion.  My eyes were drawn to the street just over her shoulder and then back to her.  I smiled, “How are you eating?” She answered, “My grandchildren have just been able to find some work, they help me”  She is still smiling.  Pleasant. No trace of bitterness of life.  There is a softness in her eyes.  Peace. Contentment.  “Where are your children,” I asked?  She simply stated, “They are all dead.”  She had outlived her children. There were many questions I wanted to ask her but heard myself ask, “May I pray for you?”  She smiled and nodded affirmatively.  I bowed my head and in that moment emotion overtook me.  I bowed lower and lower until I realized that my head was in her lap and I didn’t want to raise my head.  I felt her hand on the back of my head. The interpreter could no longer hear me and I was sobbing through the end of the prayer.

While I prayed, I heard in my spirit, “She has lived in this fishing village most of her life. She has seen much.  She has suffered much.  She has loved much.  For 112 years she has lived in poverty.  Without. With not enough.  She has lived with great loss and she has never lived with plenty.  But she has lived well.  She has lived the life I have given her. Are you living the life I gave you?”   When I finished praying, I looked up into those eyes, she was still smiling.  I wanted to freeze time.  I wanted to meet the people who had carried her there that day.  I wanted to see where she lived and how she was going to live her last days.  But in just that moment time began again and I was kneeling before the next person to pray over and when I looked up again the sea of people waiting prayer and care, seemed to have grown and she was gone.  I didn’t even see her leave…..but she left an unfading imprint upon me.

I want to remember her.  I want to remember her face, her eyes, her smile for the rest of my days.  When I think that my life is difficult and that I can’t make it in this “glass house.”  I want to remember what other women deal with as their “normal” everyday.  I want to be thankful and grateful for the smallest of things and I want to stop complaining when life and ministry is not easy.

• Remember, that most of my complaints are truly “First World” complaints. They are real but not all are life threatening.  Some are and while I do not want to minimize our pain or our journey we need to take a hard look and adjust our lives in light our plight and our pain.
• Remember, that while I was praying over that 112 year old woman she was the blessed one.  She had learned to be content in her circumstances.  Isn’t that what Paul said, “Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have.  I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything.   I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.  For I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength.” (Phil. 4:11-13)
• Finally, I think that we as American Christians have gotten the idea that we have a lot to teach the world.  I would like to submit that the world has a lot to teach us or at least the world has a lot to teach me.

 Watch more from Diane on praying on the armor for your children here 

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