Desperation

Desperation makes people do crazy things. I started thinking about this while I was looking out my window one morning, watching three men dig through the dumpsters that are outside of my house. They had huge carts with them, and were not digging for things to sell, they were digging for food to survive. Now, the likelihood that these men were drug addicts or alcoholics is very great, but the fact still remained that they were willing to dig through the trash just to find something to eat. The dumpsters aren’t nice places. I usually run past them while holding my breath as to avoid the repugnant odor that radiates from the trash. Probably 200 families use these five cans, and even with trash pickup about three times a week, there is hardly ever a time that bugs, bees, and the foulest of odors doesn’t overtake you.
I’ve never been hungry enough to dig through anything to find food; and if I’m honest, I’ve never been hungry enough to even eat leftovers, but there are times where I have felt the desperation that is similar to the kind these men must feel. I had that experience the other night. I had been throwing up for the past 5 hours, and I just couldn’t take it anymore. I was desperate for anything that would make it stop. I sent a text message to a friend, asking them to bring a gun over, and while I would have never used it, I felt, in that moment, that there was nothing else that could have made the misery that I was feeling better. It was only after I had tried 2 different medicines and several mom’s with different opinions that it occurred to me that maybe prayer would help this situation. So I prayed, as earnestly as I have ever prayed, that I would NEVER THROW UP AGAIN! I would love to say that I wasn’t sick any more after that, but that is not the case, but there was something so therapeutic about the act of praying.
I am almost embarrassed to say that it was a last resort, to even think about praying, but I hope that there comes a time when it becomes my default, the thing I do before I do anything else. Some of my favorite passages in the Bible deal are the ones when people cry out to God with all that they have; sometimes there is the expectation that HE will fix the situation, but often times, it is just the idea that God hears their prayers and takes part in their suffering with them.