The Week I Remembered How Much I Need Him

I have a confession to make.

I used to be so good about praying over everything.

There were years when I wouldn’t go to a single one of Chanse’s games without praying beforehand. I prayed for protection. I prayed against injury. I prayed for his teammates. I prayed that they would play well and, yes, of course I prayed for a win too.

Somewhere along the way, though, I stopped.

Not intentionally. I didn’t make some conscious decision that prayer wasn’t important anymore. Life just got busy. The habit faded. And apparently it faded so quietly that I didn’t even notice it was gone.

Until last Monday.

I was driving to Chanse’s soccer game when it suddenly hit me:

I haven’t been praying before his games.

And immediately, I felt convicted.

How did I get so far away from something that used to be so natural to me? How had I gone from automatically bringing these things to God to not even realizing that I wasn’t?

So right there in the car, I prayed.

I prayed for the boys. I prayed for the game. I probably threw in a request for a win because, well…I’m still a soccer mom.

But more than anything, I prayed for protection.

Specifically, I prayed against injury.

And then, toward the end of the game, my son got taken down.

It didn’t look terrible. He came off the field and was clearly hurting a little, but it didn’t seem like anything major. He didn’t complain much that night, so I didn’t think too much of it.

Then the next morning he came upstairs.

He couldn’t straighten his knee.

He could barely walk normally.

And just like that, the panic set in for both of us.

Is something torn?

How serious is this?

Is his season over?

And somewhere in the middle of all those thoughts, I had another one directed straight at God:

What in the world?

Really, God?

After realizing I hadn’t been praying, I finally prayed again. And the one specific thing I prayed wouldn’t happen…happened?

Explain that one to me.

Because sometimes prayer can be frustrating.

We don’t always say that part out loud.

We like the stories where someone prayed and the answer came exactly as requested. We love the testimonies where God’s timing makes perfect sense looking backward.

But sometimes we pray for protection and someone still gets hurt.

Sometimes we pray for peace and chaos still comes.

Sometimes we pray for a door to open and it stays firmly shut.

Sometimes we pray—and then life seems to do the exact opposite.

That night at dinner, though, I put my hand on Chanse’s knee and we prayed again.

We prayed that nothing serious was wrong. We prayed for quick healing. We prayed that it wouldn’t linger, that his season wouldn’t be over and that there wouldn’t be any lasting effects.

And then we waited.

He’s missed a couple of games. He still hasn’t officially been cleared as I write this, but everything is pointing toward him being cleared before the next one.

Praise God.

But the knee wasn’t the only thing that happened this week.

It felt like one thing after another.

There was a painful back-and-forth with someone close to me that eventually required me to remove myself from the situation.

My air conditioner went out when temperatures were pushing 100 degrees.

There were public attacks on my faith and character from people who don’t even know me.

By the end of the week, I was exhausted.

Not necessarily physically.

Mentally. Emotionally. Spiritually.

And this morning, as I sat with all of it, I felt the Spirit reminding me of something I apparently needed to remember:

I need Him.

Not just when someone is injured.

Not just when the air conditioner breaks.

Not just when someone hurts me.

Not just when life becomes uncomfortable enough that I suddenly remember to pray.

I need Him in the ordinary too.

Maybe that was the lesson hiding underneath this entire week.

I had become comfortable enough that prayer had slowly moved from my first response to something I reached for when things went wrong.

And perhaps sometimes God allows us to reach the end of our own strength so we remember where our strength was supposed to come from all along.

That doesn’t mean I believe every broken air conditioner or difficult person is a direct attack from the enemy. And I don’t pretend to know why God allows every hard thing He allows.

But I do believe Scripture when it tells us that our struggles aren’t always merely about what we can see.

“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood…” — Ephesians 6:12

I believe spiritual warfare is real.

And I’ve learned that when life feels like it’s coming from every direction, I have two choices.

I can let it pull me farther from God.

Or I can let it drive me straight back to Him.

Maybe some seasons remind us that resistance doesn’t always mean we’re on the wrong road.

Maybe sometimes the very things trying to exhaust us become the things God uses to build endurance in us.

Hebrews 12:1 tells us to “run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”

It doesn’t say the race will always feel easy.

It doesn’t say we’ll never stumble.

And it certainly doesn’t say we’ll never get tired.

It tells us to keep running.

So that’s what I’m going to do.

I’ll keep running the race.

There will probably be days when I feel beat down again. Days when my prayers seem unanswered. Days when I wonder what God is doing. Days when I realize I’ve gotten distracted and have to find my way back.

But then another morning comes.

New grace.

New mercy.

New strength.

New endurance.

“His mercies are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.” — Lamentations 3:22–23

And maybe that’s one of the greatest gifts of a difficult week:

Sometimes God uses the moments when we realize how little control we have to remind us how desperately we need Him.

Not just in the emergencies.

Not just in the battles.

Not just when we’re scared.

In everything.

So next game?

I’ll be praying.

Not because prayer guarantees that nothing bad will happen.

But because I’ve remembered that prayer was never about controlling what happens next.

It was about remembering Who I’m walking through it with.