I’ve had the opportunity to pray at some very special times and places. I’ve held new babies in my arms and thanked God the gift of new life. I’ve prayed in a federal courtroom as people from many lands became citizens of the United States. I’ve heard my voice echo through a sound system as I prayed at high school and college football games. I’ve helped people reach out to God in prayer and ask Him for his gift of salvation. I’ve prayed with my children at bedtime. All of these times of prayer are very special to me. But as I look back across my life, one prayer stands alone.
The best prayer I ever prayed happened in an old Ford van. That van had belonged to my father. He had used it in his work. He had customized that van with many ingenious touches that made it comfortable and useful. He was written all over it. But he was gone. A brain tumor took him away from us so quickly that we hardly had a chance to say goodbye. That van that had helped earn a living for our family was now my moving van as I hauled some furniture from my apartment to my parents’ home, things I had borrowed while living in a small apartment while I served as a hospital chaplain. Linda and I were to be married in a few weeks and we would have a place of our own. As I began the thirty-mile trip toward home, my mind was filled with memories of times Dad and I had ridden together. Heading out early on Saturday morning to clean carpet to earn some extra money for college. Riding together to one of my church-league basketball games. Dad showing me the most recent improvement he’d made to the ultimate work vehicle. Those were good memories. But as my mind turned away from that cherished past and toward the future, my heart ached. I thought about all the times we would miss Dad, just in the next year: my brother’s high school graduation, my sister’s wedding, my wedding, my seminary graduation, my ordination to ministry, my first church. Somewhere amid all these thoughts, I began to talk to God, first in silence, then out loud, then in a tearful angry voice, and finally in a scream. I told God that I didn’t understand. I confessed that I was angry that my father had been taken from me at such a bad time. With both tears and fire in my eyes, I cried out with a broken heart.
We find God when we search for Him with all of our hearts—all that is in our hearts. We can’t seek God and hide from Him at the same time. The same God who holds my future in His hands is great enough and loving enough to hold my questions, my struggles, even my anger. I don’t know where you will be or what you will be facing when you offer God the best prayer you’ve ever prayed, but I do know this: that prayer will be honest, it will trust God enough to seek Him with all your heart.