“If you want to know what someone is really like, you must pray with them,” a friend tells me. Perhaps she is right because it appears that Jesus judges our character by our prayers and meditations. When He saw Nathaniel, He gave him a high compliment: “Here is a true Israelite, in whom there is nothing false” (John 1:47). He was saying Nathaniel was sincere, transparent, and without hypocrisy.

Confusion and frustration flooded Jeannine Brabon. She faced a situation that made her want to run. But where could she go?

I had been lifting a need to the Lord throughout the day and that evening, the Spirit impressed upon my spirit, “Have I ever failed You?” It was a gentle reminder that He yearns for me to be confident of His care and to believe that He hears my prayer.

“Put the best construction on what others do that you can,” my mother would often tell me. I learned what that meant by watching her. She refused to believe others meant to be unkind and insisted on thinking they simply didn’t know how they came across. She always tried to understand the other person’s perspective.

When we would say God answered prayer in the nick of time, He would declare it to be “in the fullness of time” (Galatians 4:4). The secret to not losing heart when we are waiting for God to answer our prayer is in our learning to wait because we have faith that His timing is perfect.