Panting Over a Water Bowl

Before my husband and I had our boys, we got a little 3-pound Maltese puppy. Naturally, we named her Payton after Peyton Manning (Go Broncos!), brought her home, and dove into all the exciting and not-so-exciting responsibilities of a dog owner.

One thing she’s just never been very good at is going for walks.

Whenever she hears the magic word, she is beside herself excited- barely able to contain herself long enough to get her little harness on! We went through a time when we had to spell the word “walk” until we got her outside because her excitement came out in a puddle on the floor.

Now she’s 5 years old and a whopping 13 pounds. Still, once we hit that 1/2-mile mark, she is exhausted and desperately needs some water. We have a lot of dog lovers around us and some people on our route have communal dog bowls filled with water out by the sidewalk for melty dogs like mine. Everything is there for her.

There’s just one problem: she refuses to drink from these bowls.

It’s a pretty pathetic sight. Her tongue’s hanging out, panting over a big bowl of clean, cold water and she won’t drink it. She just looks up at me as if to say, “HELP, mom, I’m dying of thirst here!” Totally oblivious to the idea her thirst is 3 inches away from being satisfied.

She wants to be in the comfort of home drinking from her own bowl- not this unfamiliar one in front of her.

In 2 Kings 5, there was a man longing for healing from his terrible skin disease. In Naaman’s desperation, he traveled from his hometown to Samaria in hopes that Elisha, a prophet of God he was told about, could heal his disease. He prepared all kinds of valuable gifts to offer him, and even came with a letter of favor from his king. He planned the whole meeting in his head- exactly how he felt it should go. In his mind, Elisha would wave his hand over his skin, call upon the name of God, and cure him.

However, things didn’t go according to his plan.

Naaman’s expectations are crushed by reality starting in verse 9:

“So Naaman came with his horses and chariots and stood at the door of Elisha’s house. And Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.” But Naaman was angry and went away, saying, “Behold, I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper. Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?” So he turned and went away in a rage.” 2 Kings 5:9-12 (ESV)

Naaman thought he knew how he could be healed and it wasn’t happening for him. He almost missed receiving the answer to his plea for healing because he was blinded by the way he thought things should go.

Thankfully, he didn’t.

If you read on in the story, Naaman eventually decides to give washing in the Jordan a try with the convincing of his servants who came with him. And he was healed!

We typically know what we want God to do for us. We have no problem crying out a prayer asking God for something we need. And this is a wonderful thing!

Philippians 4 tells us:
“do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” Philippians 4:6 (ESV)

God wants us to come to Him about everything like a parent longs for their child to come to them, no matter what it is about. In Luke 12:22-34, He tells us He will take care of us and we don’t need to be anxious over any lack we perceive to have in our lives.

These are peace-filled truths we can hold onto and lean on in our every moment.

However, God doesn’t always provide for us in the way we expect. His ways of caring for us are always purposeful and greater than what we may have chosen for ourselves.

For some reason, Naaman needed to play an active part in his road to healing, and God knew that. He needed to step out in desperate faith, and walk into something uncomfortable on the path of his healing from God.

God is concerned about our needs. He’s also deeply concerned about the condition of our hearts and state of our minds. How we view God, and how we view ourselves in light of that, will completely shape who we are and how we love Him, others, and ourselves.

Answers to our prayers are not always going to drop in our laps because God knows us better than that. We don’t typically learn as much that way. Sometimes bringing us along on His path for us, actively involving us in how He’s providing for our needs, makes a much bigger, lasting impact on our hearts. Naaman almost missed God’s work in his life because it didn’t look the way he expected and he was asked to do something unnatural to him. But, his heart would undeniably never be the same after walking out of that Jordan River.

What if the physical healing you’re desperate for isn’t as much about the answer to prayer as it is about God opening your eyes to Himself and shaping your heart while you walk this path of trusting God through the process, learning His heart for you along the way?

What if part of God’s answer to your prayer over loneliness involves you stepping out of your comfort zone and reaching out to the person He points out to you? Or joining a group that would require a time commitment?

When you ask God to meet a very real need that you have, are you willing to follow His direction? Or are you panting over a water bowl desperate with thirst because you only want what’s familiar?

Don’t miss out on what God has for you because the path looks different than what you expected.

From one of His children to another,

Christi