Lenita was a missionary in Papua New Guinea who had the very generous habit of giving away gifts that were sent to her from friends in the States. It seemed the more she gave, the more she received. She chuckled when she told us that one of the nationals informed her, “You’re going to have to stop giving away so much. You’re getting too many packages.”

Doing God’s will does not mean meeting every request that others propose. Pat King in her book How to Have All the Time You Need Every Day, says that instead, it means discerning in our hearts what we’ve been called to do and saying “no” to what we haven’t been called to do.

Mary Warburton Booth, a missionary to the abused girls and women in India, received a received a letter from the mission board requesting that she “close down some of the work and cut down expenses.”*

In the children’s book The Sword Bearer, John was given a magic stone that he was to put on whenever he got into great difficulty. The stone around his neck enabled him to see things exactly as they were—not as they seemed. Once, when John thought his enemy, Ole Slapfoot, had him, he remembered his stone and hurriedly slipped it on. Suddenly he saw that Ole Slapfoot was really a non-threatening shark and his fear vanished.

In his book How to Pray, R. A. Torrey wrote of our need to come into God’s presence before we pray: “There must be a definite and conscious approach to God when we pray; we must have a definite and vivid realization that God is bending over us and listening as we pray. In much of our prayer there is really little thought of God. Our mind is taken up with the thought of what we need and not with the loving Father of whom we are seeking it. We should look to the Holy Spirit to lead us into the presence of God, and should not be hasty in words until He has brought us there.”

“A change came when I learned to use the Scriptures as a prayer book, and to turn what I read, especially the Psalms, into prayer,” J. Oswald Sanders said telling of a lasting transformation in his prayer life. God promises, “I am watching to see that my word is fulfilled” (Jeremiah 1:12). I’ve written that promise at the top of a sheet of typed Scriptures that I like to pray.

I awakened one morning at 1:30 and the words “Stir yourself” were in my mind. I found the word “stir” in Isaiah 64:7: “And there is no one who calls on Your name, Who stirs himself up to take hold of You.” (NKJV)

Ruth was brought up on the mission field in Africa and her deep desire was to return to Africa, but to her disappointment, the Lord didn’t ask her to be a missionary. She shared how sweetly Jesus met her need.