Sunday Gratitude and Prayer Requests for a Failed Lent

 Prayer Requests

Since I seemed to have failed in my first Lenten attempts, I have decided that for the remainder of Lent, if you leave a prayer request in the comments, I will be sure to pray for you and your request when I go to Adoration.  (And in between, too!) Leave them anonymously if you want...I'll still pray.

This Sunday, the first of the month, I am grateful for:

1. Being witness to a truly historical moment--the first resignation of a pope in 600 years.

2. Trader Joe's Organic Gingermints

 

3. Work for next week...when you freelance, it's always great to have work

4. Fast wifi.  I sometimes wonder what we did without the Internet and without wifi.

5. A balanced checkbook. I consider it quite wonderful when the bank and I agree. 

Sunday Gratitude and Prayer Scorecard

This Sunday in February, I am grateful for:

 1. Someone to watch the cats aka the Royal Pair when I have to take a short trip later in the month. As you can see, they are a bit of a, um, challenge.

2. For a bouquet of flowers that I allowed myself to splurge on at the market.
3. For extra-soft kleenix during an allergy attack
4. A night's sleep without griefwalking dreams
5. The prayers of a healing friend.

As for the Prayer Scorecard:

Like January itself, it was a month of silence. I think the fields of my prayers were lying fallow. I am hoping that, just as I am beginning to see hints of buds on the trees and the promise that spring is coming, that some of my prayers, which have been on the list for a year, will begin to find blossoming answers.

But for now, it's:
3 Yes, including a good medical report, an easy repair to a complex problem, and a simple solution to a medication change.
11 Not Yet, including the return of stolen property, financial concerns, and a broken printer that is supposed to have been fixed but is still awaiting the right part.
0 No

A Year (Almost) of Prayer

Since last May I've been keeping a Prayer Scorecard, a list of answered and unanswered prayers. The original idea was to help me see if my prayers were really being answered. It had been a bleak and difficult year and I needed some measurable evidence.

Now that the year is coming to an end, I've tallied up the prayers. Now, many of them, especially the ones that are still in the Wait or Not Yet Answered category have been moved from month to month, so the tally isn't completely accurate. But the ratio of yes, no and not yet is what interests me.

So, from May to December, there have been:
47 Yes
25 No
78 Not Yet

So, I have had nearly twice as many prayer requests granted as I have had denied. But nearly as many prayers as the combined yes and no are still unanswered. Since most of these, if not all, eventually have to have a yes or no, I'm going to continue keeping the Score Card for a few more months, at least.

And I continue to hope that the majority of prayers will be "yes" again in 2013.

A Year (Almost) of Prayer

Since last May I've been keeping a Prayer Scorecard, a list of answered and unanswered prayers. The original idea was to help me see if my prayers were really being answered. It had been a bleak and difficult year and I needed some measurable evidence.

Now that the year is coming to an end, I've tallied up the prayers. Now, many of them, especially the ones that are still in the Wait or Not Yet Answered category have been moved from month to month, so the tally isn't completely accurate. But the ratio of yes, no and not yet is what interests me.

So, from May to December, there have been:
47 Yes
25 No
78 Not Yet

So, I have had nearly twice as many prayer requests granted as I have had denied. But nearly as many prayers as the combined yes and no are still unanswered. Since most of these, if not all, eventually have to have a yes or no, I'm going to continue keeping the Score Card for a few more months, at least.

And I continue to hope that the majority of prayers will be "yes" again in 2013.

Sunday Gratitude and September Prayer

I'm sort of tired today so the day has ebbed off the page.  And I'm really irritated because I lost one of my favorite opal earrings.  Grrrrr....Since I went to several stores, it could be anywhere and retracing all my steps would be impossible.  Grrrr....

But despite that, today I am grateful:

1. The fountain the cats jarred without my knowing it and that had been leaking on the floor for several days didn't ruin anything that I can see.
2. That I was able to find the exact kind of pantry moth trap that I wanted.
3. Pumpkin spice muffins.
4. A good conversation in the ongoing healing of a relationship.
5. My library with its great librarians...and the fact I thought I had lost my library card, but it was actually stuck to the back of my driver's license.

As for the Prayer Score Card, it was an interesting month .
2 Yes
0 No
14 Unanswered.

The two yes had to do  with some aid with finances and the good results of a series of medical tests. The unanswered run the gamut from finances to relationships to life changes.  And so far, all of them are in a holding pattern, no answer and not even a real direction so far.

As I said, it was an interesting month, prayer-wise.

Sunday Gratitude and Answers to Prayer

On an overcast Sunday, I am grateful for:

1. The fact that I am (sort of) caught up with deadlines. I think I see light.
2.  I find watching the squirrel annoy the cats to be highly entertaining.
3.  I got a new Netflix film this week, after finally deciding I wasn't going to watch the one I had.
4.  We had a huge rain storm, which gave the plants a dosing, but it didn't herald a week of rain like it often does.
5. A friend of mine who went in for numerous lumps in her breast learned they were all benign.

And the prayer report thus far for July:
Yes--6 with 2 of them that aren't cut and dried.  But they seem mostly yes.
No--5
No answer--9

And so it goes.

Sunday Gratitude on Monday and Answers to Prayer

I have been neglectful of the blog this past week. I could offer reasons, but they are merely excuses.

So here's Sunday's Gratitude on Monday:
1.  Blueberries.  A friend let me pick a gallon-sack-full of her luscious berries. Big and blue!
2.  Sunshine.  Here in Oregon, it's always important to acknowledge the sun.
3. I've been dealing with some health issues and I think some positive progress is being made.
4. I had a skin "spot" removed and it was taken care of before it developed into something.

5. I put out a bird feeder and while the squirrel spotted it, he didn't figure out how to get to it. He will eventually I'm sure, but for n11ow it's Me 1, Squirrel 0.

And now an update on the Prayers.  I have 19 things on my list right now. (Okay, so I'm needy.  And your point?)

At the moment, the "answer" count stands at:
2 maybe 3 Yesish.  
7 No
11 No answer.

Yes, I realize that doesn't add up to 19.  That's because a couple of the yes answers could be either a "yes" or "no" depending.

For instance, the skin spot.  I had prayed that it would be "nothing."  It was a "something," but it was found early and removed. So it that a yes or no answer?

Another one had to do with some direction in life. I wasn't really clear in my prayer...asking merely to know what to do.  I had a definite preference, however.  If I had prayed for that, the answer would be "no."  But since a door was slammed shut and bolted with about 50 padlocks, I did know what I had to do.  Not what I wanted, but I no longer had a choice.  So is that a yes or a no?

The final yes was a deadend in a road.  So I got a sort of a yes to the prayer, but it also was another stop sign. So is that a yes or a no.

You see my problem with the yeses right now.

As for the no's, they were generally very clear. No. Nada. Not at all. Not happening.

And the remainder go on as they have been since I started this project. Prayers for a future, for resolution, for restoration, for healing, for wisdom...and a couple of right now things that will either be a yes or no.

And with that....