I never really thought of myself as a prayer person.  You know those people who have this “thing” for prayer?  I wasn’t one of them.  I prayed—don’t get me wrong—but I didn’t see that as a way God really used me.  My “thing” was to talk to people about Jesus, and then I would pray for them at the end of the conversation if they let me. 

Now God is starting to change that.  I do not talk to people any less, but my desire to pray for people is growing.  I have found that I love praying for people on the street—even outside of the Jesus Kitchen, where I have long been accustomed to praying over people I barely know.  I have made it a rule for myself that when I give money to people begging on the street, I offer to pray for them.  So far, no one has declined; sometimes they inch away uncertainly, but other times I see tears in their eyes.  I have also found that I love it when I have an opportunity to do more than pray silently for people when I am at the Hard Times Café.  The other day, a guy came up to me with an amusing attempt at a pick-up line: “Where in Russia are you from?  You look Russian; you can’t be from America.”  After he sat down at my table, apparently astounded that I was born and raised in Wisconsin, I began to ask him about himself.  Like most people do when you seem genuinely interested in them as human beings, he opened up very quickly and began telling me about some things in his life that had caused him real pain.  I talked to him a little about how I believe God related to his circumstances and offered to pray for him.  As so often happens when I pray over people, his eyes welled up with tears. 

There are so many people on the West Bank—and everywhere in our world—who are aching inwardly for more in life but who live on an empty, superficial level.  I love having the chance to look at them more deeply and see what is really going on inside; sometimes, I think people don’t know themselves until someone else says something.  I love sitting at Hard Times, looking around the room at people, and asking God to show me what they are feeling; I then pray about that for them.  But I want to do more than that.  So I am planning to expand the prayer “ministry” at Hard Times.  (I put quotation marks around “ministry” because I do not like a label that makes this sound like a program.  I just see hurting, lonely people and want to do more to show them love.)  First of all, I am looking for people at the Salvage Yard who have heart for the West Bank to join me in praying at the Hard Times.  I am not yet sure if I want to organize 22-hour periods of continuous prayer there (they are closed from 4:00-6:00am, so we cannot be there 24 hours) or have one different person pray there every day in addition to myself.  But I am seeing the effect of spending time there, becoming known by the people, and establishing spiritual authority, and I want even more of that.  I think more prayer is key.  Secondly, I think that I am going to start sitting with a sign that says, “I would love to pray for you.  Just ask.”  In all honesty, I do not want to do this, because it is embarrassing, and I will feel like “that obnoxious Christian,” the stereotype of whom I am always trying to break.  I suspect there will be a negative response from many people.  But I believe this is something God would like me to do, and I believe that there will be people who take me up on the offer.  And if it gives me a chance to pray over more people, it’s worth it to me. 

So please continue to lift up the West Bank in your prayers and ask for God to move in power there.  Ephesians 3:20 says that God is able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine, and I am waiting to see that—sometimes not very patiently.  I am quite glad that God told us to pray persistently, as if petitioning an unrighteous judge (Luke 18:1-8), because I sure bug him a lot about changing the scene on the West Bank!

Before drawing this to a close, I want to explain a bit to those of you who support me financially or who have considered doing so.  Because I have a job now, you may feel like this financial support is unnecessary.  While I despise asking for money, I need to explain why that is not the case.  As I have said before, my goal is to expand my support base enough in the next few years to stop working a “normal” job, or at least cut down to part-time.  If people refrain from supporting me until I am not employed, there is no way to build up that support base and thus allow me to leave the job I have.  However, I understand that you may not want to give money to someone who has regular employment when there are full-time missionaries who do not have that income.  That is why I want to assure you that any support I receive at this point is going to be put into a separate account used only for missions expenses my income does not cover—like plane tickets to New Zealand, for example.  This way, I can be responsible with your contributions while still building a base of support that will allow me to devote more time to ministry in the future.  I hope this helps you understand why I am still raising support.  I do not want to take advantage of your generosity in any way, and if you ever have questions about how I am handling the money you so graciously provide, feel free to contact me.  I want to be open, honest, and accountable in this area, as well as all others.

Thank you so much for the part you play in my life.  You are such a blessing to me.

Take hold of the life that is truly life!

Molly S. Waggoner