August Prayer Calendar: Uprooted

This month our guest writer is Sarah Dudt. Sarah is the director of marketing for Awana. During a recent vacation, she experieced the power of nature that, as grand as it is, does not equate to the power of God in our lives. 

Have you ever seen a tree uprooted? 

A recent vacation brought me to Sequoia National Park. The national park in California is home to the biggest trees in the world — notably the General Sherman Tree, a giant sequoia that dominates the Giant Forest and is the largest single-stem tree in the world. Some of the sequoias in the park are over 100 feet in circumference and over 250 feet in height. 

For an act of nature to uproot some of these trees, an extensive amount of force — over 100 mph winds — plays a factor. These trees are big, but not as big as Christ’s love for us. The work we do at Awana every week — equipping leaders to reach kids with the Gospel around the world — is more significant than the size of these trees. 

Ephesians 3:14-21 paints such a vivid picture of being planted in Christ’s love:
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

I’m reminded through these verses of God’s love: the width, length, height and depth of a God who loves us so much, not because of what we’ve done or haven’t done, not because we deserve it, but because of Who He is. His love for us does not uproot. Douse the weeds of unworthiness and insecurity with that truth!

It’s that sort of deep-rooted love that allows us to confront injustice, show mercy in the face of darkness and offer hope to others.

We can weather a storm because of the deep roots of God’s love in us. Unlike the knock-out Sequoia tree I saw that was completely uprooted, we can stand firm in the face of adversity through the power that comes from the Lord.

My prayer for you is that you will see God at work, accomplishing more than you could ever imagine — work that only He can do. It’s the prayer found in the verses in Ephesians 20-21: Now to Him Who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we could ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. 

Each month we publish a calendar of prayers and praises from our family of Awana Clubs leaders around the world. If you’d like to join us in praying for kids and leaders everywhere, please go to awana.org/prayer.