Day 6—A Heart Revealed  

I just need a sign. Just one little sign. Please, God. I just need a sign.

That’s all I kept hearing from this woman who had seen her share of hardships. I could relate to her need to know that God was hearing her. There were many nights where I would fall on my knees in such pain over what seemed to be unanswered prayers that I, too, would shout to God, “Show me that you are there in my life!”

Oh how desperately I wanted signs from heaven as well.

But as I made my way through the tough wilderness I was in, I eventually came to realize what Elijah discovered that day on the side of the mountain after the wind, fire and earthquake all subsided. Elijah’s sign that God was there with him was found in the silences all around him. This woman, though, wasn’t ready for God to be in the silences around her.

So I sat with her and listened as she expressed her pleas for a sign from God. And I, as a pastor, found myself trying to redirect her gaze to seeing the angels—the ordinary men and women—who were already there in her life supporting her, loving her, praying for her and helping her. I guess in a way I was trying to soften the blow for her for not getting any sign from God. Perhaps in a way I didn’t want any responsibility for God’s failure in delivering a sign. Not that I have such power in what God does or doesn’t do. I know it sounds weird to even think God could fail because God NEVER FAILS us. But I think it was more I just didn’t want this woman’s faith to fail if the sign she wanted never came. And so I kept trying to redirect her eyes to all the angels in her life instead.

She took note of those angels, wiped her tears and said, “Thanks, but I still just want a sign.”

After she left I wondered if she would get what she was looking for. Perhaps there were many signs already on her path that she was for some reason blind to. I just wasn’t sure. I just didn’t know. I wondered. Was God hearing her?

The following morning I awoke to an email that my eyes couldn’t believe.

There on the screen was a note from this woman telling me, “My sign from God came! I can’t stop praising Him. Look what I saw in my yard this morning.”

Attached to the note was the picture of snow melting away and revealing the ground beneath. The snow, though, was melting in such a way that it formed a perfect heart on the ground.

God heard her prayer. She received her sign. For her prayer was for frozen hearts to melt and for love to come into her life.

Skeptics will say that a sign from God can be seen in anything, that is, if you are so desperate to see a sign from God. But this melting snow in the shape of heart was not a case of wanting to see something so badly that you could make nothing into something. This melting snow in the shape of heart was the sign from God this woman refused to stop believing would come.

I joined her that morning in praising and thanking God. And I learned my lesson. Never redirect eyes away from wanting to see a sign from God. Rather encourage those eyes that want to see God so badly. For God NEVER FAILS those who never stop seeking Him.

This Way of Life Lenten Challenge: Open your eyes to the signs God puts in front of you. But more importantly open your hearts in believing that God will answer your prayers in the most amazing ways.