Prayer

I solicit your prayers of thanksgiving, and your prayers of petition.

First, the thanksgiving:

A while back I solicited your prayers for a friend experiencing trouble in his marriage (Prayer request, Tuesday, January 16, 2007). Since then the situation escalated to the point where the couple broke the news to their three young children that they were planning to separate. About three weeks of living hell passed with each member of the family living as though the Sword of Damocles were hanging over the family. It was so easy to see the truth of St. Paul's words that our warfare is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers -- in other words, that it's a spiritual battle. The spiritual blindness that descended upon the principals was palpable, if not diabolic. All we could do, and we did certainly do, was to pray.

Today the family is together, the parents reconciled, committed to going to counseling, and a peace descended upon their household that would have been unimaginable just days ago. For all ordinary human intents and purposes, this was a doomed marriage. Given contemporary trends and statistics, once a marriage heads down the road of alienation that far, there is virtually no turning back. God does miraculous work. Do continue to remember this couple and family in your prayers, nevertheless, as they will doubtless need the Lord's continued grace as they learn to 'trust' the sense of normalcy as it settles back in to their household again.

Second, the intercession.

A friend asks prayer for a dear friend and colleague for the better part of 3 decades, Helen S. She has been battling breast cancer for the past 8 months or so, and it seems she is close to ending that battle and meeting our Lord. Please remember her and her family, if you will, at this difficult time.

God bless you.