July Prayer Calendar: He Always Answers Prayers

Have you ever been unable to pray for yourself? This month, Awana Marketing Copywriter Kristen Cherry shares her experience with prayer at a time when she most needed the Lord’s blessing. Spoiler: Whether you pray or someone else prays for you, God always answers.

I’m a musical person; it’s how I connect with the world, my feelings and often the Lord. So when I think of prayer, I frequently think of songs.

When Garth Brooks sings, “… some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers,” two things come to mind: 

1) kneeling in my room at age 15, fervently praying a boy would please, please call me back. He never called. 

2) There are no unanswered prayers; there are just answers we don’t like.

Fifteen-year-old me’s “unanswered prayer” was the Lord wisely placing me on another path, one that led to my husband. We’re blessed with three daughters, which I also credit to the power of prayer. 

Our first daughter came in 2009, a prayer asked and answered with little turmoil and lots of love. When we tried for a second, it took two years and the help of fertility specialists. When we did get pregnant, it was twins! But our excitement was quickly tinged with worry, as a rare condition of the pregnancy could mean there was only a 50% likelihood of both babies surviving. I spent the first 12 weeks getting weekly high-definition ultrasounds, emotionally detached to the twins because I assumed things would not end well. 

“What a Friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear!

What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer!

O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear,

All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.”

During that 12th week, in a Sunday school class led by loving husband and wife John and Trudy, I finally shared our situation. Trudy called the whole class together to pray specifically for my husband, me and the babies. It was the first time I had ever been gathered around and prayed for directly, and the comfort that day was unlike any other. When Trudy said, “God, you’ve got this,” I finally believed He did.

My next ultrasound appointment revealed that our condition had righted itself. Fourteen weeks in, I was able to just breathe and to embrace my twins as two babies who would survive and thrive!

Prayer gave me hope when I didn’t have it. And perhaps because I didn’t have hope, I needed someone else to pray on my behalf until I could do it for myself. I am so thankful my Sunday school class did.

There are many other Awana leaders and kids around the world who need your prayers. Please join us this month in praying for them. Download the Awana Daily Prayer calendar for July and sign up to become a prayer partner. When you do, prayer calendars will be sent to you automatically each month.