Thank you for praying

I was just reading a portion of When I Don't Desire God by John Piper. If you haven't ever read this book, I highly recommend it. It was a major player in my desire to memorize Scripture and supplied the original method I used.

What I read today was a small segment on prayer; more specifically, the power of others praying for you and with you. Piper writes, "One of God's reasons for calling us to corporate prayer is given in 2 Corinthians 1:11. Paul asks for prayer for himself and gives his reason: 'You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.' When people are involved in each other's lives, more thanksgiving rises to God when any of them is blessed."

This immediately brought to mind the many, many people who prayed for Owen's December arrival. I want to take this moment to say, "Thank you!!" We received abundant blessing because you prayed AND God was more glorified because you all rejoiced and thanked Him when we were blessed. Isn't God good? He designed things to work this way. He caused us to desire Owen to be born in December. He caused us to ask others to join with us in prayer. He blessed us. All because it pleased Him to do so. There is no one like our God!

So, because of the power of our God and the way He blessed your prayers last time, we would like you to join us in praying for a house. We desire to buy a home this spring/summer and are asking God to provide a place for our family. We would like to put down roots here. We desire a home that will allow us to grow as a family, practice hospitality often, and have a renter that we could build a relationship with and involve in our family life. We are asking God for these thing, so when you think of us, please ask God on our behalf! Thank you in advance for the help!

Father, thank you for your Word and for loving to hear our prayers. You are indeed a prayer-hearing God. You call us to cast our cares on you and to present our requests to you. You know the desires of our heart and so we ask that you would provide abundantly and beyond our expectations! We pray that it would please you to do so and that YOU would be glorified!