The alarm clock went off way too early this morning, 3:30 to be exact. Twenty minutes later, I was out the door heading to a hospital an hour and 20 minutes away. A church member, a very dear friend, would be having very serious open-heart surgery.
The family got there a few minutes before I did. Once I arrived, we had a good session of prayer before my friend was taken down to surgery. The family and I made our way to the waiting room for one of the hardest parts of an ordeal like this: sitting and waiting and feeling helpless.
Helpless, though, may not be quite the right word. No, none of us were able to go into the operating room and participate in the life-saving surgery. If we had, there is no doubt that all of us would have done nothing but make matters worse.
But there is something we were able to do, and we and our entire church did so. We prayed - we prayed very hard. We still believe in a God who can heal. We have seen him do so many times, even in some cases where the medical community had proclaimed the cause to be utterly hopeless and lost.
Late in the morning, I spoke to my wife by telephone. While I was attending to surgery, she was sitting in on another one in another hospital. As we spoke, she said, "Let me tell you about your daughter "
That statement could be a frightening one, don't you think? But in this case, what I heard thrilled my soul. "I noticed she did not eat last night or this morning. I asked why. Turns out she is fasting for brother Buck."
I do not know how other parents may feel, but I would rather my children be anonymous and godly than rich and famous for leaked sex tapes. If I can raise three children who believe God and seek him with all their hearts, I can die a happy man one day.
The surgery, by the way, was a success. I praise God for using men and women of medical science who are, in the words of the great Johannes Kepler, "Thinking God's thoughts after him."
But my heart right now is mostly drawn to the fact that my daughter was fasting over a diseased heart. And that, friends, is quite the idea in our world today.
I do not think I have ever seen such a deeply diseased heart in our society in my lifetime. Hatred, violence, perversion, dishonesty, unkindness the list could go on forever.
A few days ago, my wife and I stopped to help a young lady broken down in traffic. Within seconds, three things happened. One, a boy on a bicycle shouted at me, "Get out of the way, boy!" Then people in traffic started honking and cursing at the woman and at us. Then another lady motioned for my wife to roll down the window and berated her for "being in the way."
No one tried to help. Everyone was clearly "looking out for No. 1." Diseased our society's heart is deeply diseased.
So what are we to do? I am quite certain that the answer does not lie in everyone looking out for himself or herself, or his side or her side. I am just as certain that the answer lies at least partially in the kind of self-sacrifice that manifests itself in skipping meals and dedicating that time to praying one for another.
In Matthew 17:21, when faced with a particularly powerful devil that the disciples could not seem to handle, Jesus said, "This kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting."
What could things be like if people who were on opposite ends of issues fasted and prayed for each other rather than cursing and hating each other?
Bo Wagner is pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church of Mooresboro, N.C., a widely traveled evangelist and author of several books available on Amazon and at www.wordofhismouth.com. He can be reached by email at 2knowhim@cbc-web.org.