Prayer is Powerful

Even in tragedy, God is working. Our country is in a place where prayer is no longer welcome in many places, including some classrooms, boardrooms and playing fields.

But in a moment when the country and parts of the world held their breath waiting for signs of life from a young player that many of us had never heard of, something began to move. Players kneeled in a circle around Damar Hamlin to protect his privacy – and to pray.

Commentators bowed their heads on network television. Facebook and Instagram profile pictures began to change to images of Damar. Feeds were flooded with prayers. Prayer took a front row seat.

We watched and waited in the coming days for signs of hope and life from this young athlete that had captured the hearts and prayers of strangers. And when he awoke, a palatable sense of victory, praise, light and hope washed over conversations everywhere. The power of prayer had created a miracle on that football field.

God had more for Damar, and He had more for us. He had a lesson that I know He wanted us to hear. He sees how divided we are and how we rely on our worldly solutions to problems instead of looking to the Kingdom of Heaven. We spend our time finding ways to divide ourselves into categories that align with our individual views and shun those who speak and act differently. He showed us that night that we are all His children and that He implores us to love one another as He loves us.

He doesn’t want it to require something so horrible and tragic as Damar’s injury to remind us to pray and to find reasons to glorify Him in the small things.

I don’t want to see the ugliness of greed, competition and politics creep back in to divide us and weaken that thread that tied us all together that night.

The reminder I carried from Damar was: Don’t wait. Don’t wait for prayer to be a last course of action. Pray first. I wear a rubber band on my wrist that has those very words on it: Pray First. A reminder that in all I do and in the answers I seek to any challenge in my life, I need to pray first.