Prayer That Avails Much....
The following is a chapter from
Preparing The Way by Cal Pierce.
May it speak to your heart as it did to mine.
The Genesis of the Burden: David's Heart
Many people ask me how I happened to receive a burden for reopening of the Healing Rooms in the first place, and I have to admit that it didn't begin in my own heart. It actually came from the heart of David, our youngest son.
When David was just seven years old, he was diagnosed with Duchenne type (pseudohypertrophic) muscular dystrophy, a disease whose common symptom is the weakening and wasting away of healthy muscle tissue. Duchenne affects children, and those who have it typically do not survive to become adults. By the time David was ten, he was already confined to a wheelchair, and he needed our help to do most things.
Michelle and I divided the labor in this regard. For instance, it was her job to get David up in the morning and get him ready for school, and it was my job to put him to bed every night. He had a motorized wheelchair and was able to get around at school and to wheel himself around the house. During the night, we would take turns getting up to turn him over every two hours so that he would not develop bedsores. By the time he was sixteen, David could move only his hands and his head.
As his physical condition deteriorated, however, David began to develop a heart after God. This was interesting, because my wife and I were stuck in a sort of religious mode at the time. We were Christians, but we were not very excited about the Lord and were not really praying like we should have been. We went to church on Sunday mornings and took David with us, but we were not interested in other services. Suddenly, David wanted to be in every service. He didn't want to miss the Sunday evening service or the youth service. I would load him up in the van and drop him off at church, and then I would go somewhere to have coffee, do some shopping or just walk around until he was finished. Then I would pick him up, and we would go home.
David's passion for God increased to the point that he would call me to his room each evening to help him get ready to read the Bible. I had built a special table for him that he could wheel his chair under. When he was ready, I would help him get his arms and hands up onto the table and then put the Bible where he could manipulate the pages of it. He would sit there and study the Bible for the next several hours.
After David had read the Bible for two hours or more each evening, then he would begin to pray. We always left his door open so that we could hear him if he needed anything, and occasionally throughout the evening, when I would pass by on my way from the television to the bathroom, I would hear him praying. He was actually interceding for others. He was praying for America, for his classmates, for our neighbors and for us, his parents and siblings. David had a heart for people who were hurting, and he felt their needs.
When I would hear him praying like this, my heart would break. Why didn't I know God the way my son did? He had such passion for the things of the Lord. Why didn't I share that passion? We had often given him opportunity to do other things, but this was what he wanted to do. In fact, this was all he wanted to do. Knowing God better was his sole desire. He wasn't interested in other things. He wasn't even interested in his sickness. It did not consume him, as is the case with many sick people. He was consumed with the desire for God.
Occasionally, as I was heading to work late in the morning, I would see David and his classmates in the school yard as I drove by. Most of the children were playing on the courts, but David was always sitting over by the gymnasium alone in his wheelchair. The thought of my son not being able to be involved in the activities of other children was one that devastated me personally. From David's perspective, however, this wasn't bad at all. Being alone and apart from the rest of the group, he could talk to the Lord. I had a hard time understanding his way of thinking, but I was deeply convicted by his deep devotion to God.
We had a large deck that wrapped around the house, and David was able to maneuver his chair out there into the fresh air when the weather permitted. We would hear him out there, going back and forth, talking to God.
One evening my wife and I heard David crying and rushed to his side. He had wheeled himself into the hallway. "What's wrong?" we asked. He said that he had a bad thought, and it was easy to see that this had broken his heart.That deeply sincere confession crushed me. I had many bad thoughts, but I had grown so calloused that I never let that fact bother me. David loved Jesus so much that having one bad thought had brought him to tears. Again, I felt ashamed of myself.
One day we asked David, " If you could have any wish, what would you ask for?" I was sure that he would say that he wanted to get up and walk like other kids and do things they were doing. That would have been very normal for any boy David's age. He didn't answer quickly. His eyes moved up and to the ceiling, and he looked there for a few minutes, obviously searching his soul for the answer. When he finally answered, it surprised both of us: " Nothing!" he said.
I couldn't believe what I was hearing. My son, who was practically helpless and had very little to look forward to in life, did not feel the need for anything at all. How could that be? I thought about all the things for which I might have asked, given the same opportunity, and they were many. But David was sufficiently filled by his knowledge of and his love for Jesus so that he didn't need anything else. How utterly amazing!
Throughout the seventh and eighth grades and on into high school, every paper David wrote for class was about Jesus. Jesus was his life, and everything he did was about the Lord.
Then, for a period in 1989, each evening, when I would go into David's room to get him ready for bed, he would ask me if he could stay up a little later because he had more that he wanted to pray about. Even though he had school the next day, each evening he wanted to extend this time even more. "Can I please stay up just a little later," he would plead. I think he would have prayed all night, if I had let him, but around 11:30 I would go in and insist that he just had to get some sleep so he could go to school the next day. David reluctantly agreed.
When I finally did start getting David ready for bed each of those nights, I would find that his clothes were wet from perspiration because of his exertions in prayer, so wet that they stuck to his body. Even his socks and shoes were wet.
After this had gone on about ten days, I asked David one night what was so important that he was exerting himself so in prayer. His answer amazed me. " We've been studying Russia in class, and I'm praying that the walls of Communism will come down so that the Gospel can go into that country and the people can be saved."
My God, I thought, how could such a young man have a burden like this? I had never prayed for the Iron Curtain to fall, and yet my sixteen-year-old son was doing it, and with such fervency. What motivated him?
Not more than thirty days after that happened, the lead story on all the news programs was that the Berlin Wall had been breached, and I saw the East German people pouring through it and tearing it apart piece by piece. I was overcome with emotion and began to weep. If the prayers of a teenager could have such an effect, surely God would hear me too. If David's prayers could shake a nation and tear down a wall, then I must begin to do my share.
Suddenly I desperately wanted to know God as David did. I cried out to God, "God, I want to know You, and I will know You in the way David does." The change I sought as a result of David's impact on my life did not come immediately, but it would come.
A few years later, before his twenty-first birthday, David slipped away from us and went to be with his Savior. One moment he was here, and the next he was gone. In one sense, Michelle and I were devastated. We had loved him so much. But in another sense, our cup was full. We felt very privileged to have had David in our home. He had left us with a vision, a vision to work toward the saving of America, a vision to bring healing to our nation and our people. In time, that vision would become clear.
The Genesis of the Burden: David's Heart
Many people ask me how I happened to receive a burden for reopening of the Healing Rooms in the first place, and I have to admit that it didn't begin in my own heart. It actually came from the heart of David, our youngest son.
When David was just seven years old, he was diagnosed with Duchenne type (pseudohypertrophic) muscular dystrophy, a disease whose common symptom is the weakening and wasting away of healthy muscle tissue. Duchenne affects children, and those who have it typically do not survive to become adults. By the time David was ten, he was already confined to a wheelchair, and he needed our help to do most things.
Michelle and I divided the labor in this regard. For instance, it was her job to get David up in the morning and get him ready for school, and it was my job to put him to bed every night. He had a motorized wheelchair and was able to get around at school and to wheel himself around the house. During the night, we would take turns getting up to turn him over every two hours so that he would not develop bedsores. By the time he was sixteen, David could move only his hands and his head.
As his physical condition deteriorated, however, David began to develop a heart after God. This was interesting, because my wife and I were stuck in a sort of religious mode at the time. We were Christians, but we were not very excited about the Lord and were not really praying like we should have been. We went to church on Sunday mornings and took David with us, but we were not interested in other services. Suddenly, David wanted to be in every service. He didn't want to miss the Sunday evening service or the youth service. I would load him up in the van and drop him off at church, and then I would go somewhere to have coffee, do some shopping or just walk around until he was finished. Then I would pick him up, and we would go home.
David's passion for God increased to the point that he would call me to his room each evening to help him get ready to read the Bible. I had built a special table for him that he could wheel his chair under. When he was ready, I would help him get his arms and hands up onto the table and then put the Bible where he could manipulate the pages of it. He would sit there and study the Bible for the next several hours.
After David had read the Bible for two hours or more each evening, then he would begin to pray. We always left his door open so that we could hear him if he needed anything, and occasionally throughout the evening, when I would pass by on my way from the television to the bathroom, I would hear him praying. He was actually interceding for others. He was praying for America, for his classmates, for our neighbors and for us, his parents and siblings. David had a heart for people who were hurting, and he felt their needs.
When I would hear him praying like this, my heart would break. Why didn't I know God the way my son did? He had such passion for the things of the Lord. Why didn't I share that passion? We had often given him opportunity to do other things, but this was what he wanted to do. In fact, this was all he wanted to do. Knowing God better was his sole desire. He wasn't interested in other things. He wasn't even interested in his sickness. It did not consume him, as is the case with many sick people. He was consumed with the desire for God.
Occasionally, as I was heading to work late in the morning, I would see David and his classmates in the school yard as I drove by. Most of the children were playing on the courts, but David was always sitting over by the gymnasium alone in his wheelchair. The thought of my son not being able to be involved in the activities of other children was one that devastated me personally. From David's perspective, however, this wasn't bad at all. Being alone and apart from the rest of the group, he could talk to the Lord. I had a hard time understanding his way of thinking, but I was deeply convicted by his deep devotion to God.
We had a large deck that wrapped around the house, and David was able to maneuver his chair out there into the fresh air when the weather permitted. We would hear him out there, going back and forth, talking to God.
One evening my wife and I heard David crying and rushed to his side. He had wheeled himself into the hallway. "What's wrong?" we asked. He said that he had a bad thought, and it was easy to see that this had broken his heart.That deeply sincere confession crushed me. I had many bad thoughts, but I had grown so calloused that I never let that fact bother me. David loved Jesus so much that having one bad thought had brought him to tears. Again, I felt ashamed of myself.
One day we asked David, " If you could have any wish, what would you ask for?" I was sure that he would say that he wanted to get up and walk like other kids and do things they were doing. That would have been very normal for any boy David's age. He didn't answer quickly. His eyes moved up and to the ceiling, and he looked there for a few minutes, obviously searching his soul for the answer. When he finally answered, it surprised both of us: " Nothing!" he said.
I couldn't believe what I was hearing. My son, who was practically helpless and had very little to look forward to in life, did not feel the need for anything at all. How could that be? I thought about all the things for which I might have asked, given the same opportunity, and they were many. But David was sufficiently filled by his knowledge of and his love for Jesus so that he didn't need anything else. How utterly amazing!
Throughout the seventh and eighth grades and on into high school, every paper David wrote for class was about Jesus. Jesus was his life, and everything he did was about the Lord.
Then, for a period in 1989, each evening, when I would go into David's room to get him ready for bed, he would ask me if he could stay up a little later because he had more that he wanted to pray about. Even though he had school the next day, each evening he wanted to extend this time even more. "Can I please stay up just a little later," he would plead. I think he would have prayed all night, if I had let him, but around 11:30 I would go in and insist that he just had to get some sleep so he could go to school the next day. David reluctantly agreed.
When I finally did start getting David ready for bed each of those nights, I would find that his clothes were wet from perspiration because of his exertions in prayer, so wet that they stuck to his body. Even his socks and shoes were wet.
After this had gone on about ten days, I asked David one night what was so important that he was exerting himself so in prayer. His answer amazed me. " We've been studying Russia in class, and I'm praying that the walls of Communism will come down so that the Gospel can go into that country and the people can be saved."
My God, I thought, how could such a young man have a burden like this? I had never prayed for the Iron Curtain to fall, and yet my sixteen-year-old son was doing it, and with such fervency. What motivated him?
Not more than thirty days after that happened, the lead story on all the news programs was that the Berlin Wall had been breached, and I saw the East German people pouring through it and tearing it apart piece by piece. I was overcome with emotion and began to weep. If the prayers of a teenager could have such an effect, surely God would hear me too. If David's prayers could shake a nation and tear down a wall, then I must begin to do my share.
Suddenly I desperately wanted to know God as David did. I cried out to God, "God, I want to know You, and I will know You in the way David does." The change I sought as a result of David's impact on my life did not come immediately, but it would come.
A few years later, before his twenty-first birthday, David slipped away from us and went to be with his Savior. One moment he was here, and the next he was gone. In one sense, Michelle and I were devastated. We had loved him so much. But in another sense, our cup was full. We felt very privileged to have had David in our home. He had left us with a vision, a vision to work toward the saving of America, a vision to bring healing to our nation and our people. In time, that vision would become clear.
