The Prayer List with No Ticks

Claire liked boxes she could tick.

She had never thought of this as a spiritual gift. In fact her husband Mark had occasionally suggested that it might be a mild condition requiring treatment.

The shopping list had boxes. The jobs for Saturday had boxes. The Christmas card list had boxes. Even the list of people who had borrowed casserole dishes after church had once acquired boxes until Mark quietly pointed out that perhaps crockery did not require an audit trail.

Claire disagreed but removed the boxes.

Her prayer notebook had them too.

She had started the notebook twenty three years earlier when the children were small and most prayers seemed to concern fevers, school troubles, money and the mysterious ability of washing machines to break only when the laundry basket was full.

At the top of each page she wrote a date. Beneath it came the names and needs. Beside each one she drew a small square.

When an answer came she ticked it.

Sometimes the answer was almost immediate. A job was found. A scan came back clear. A friendship was repaired. A child passed an exam everyone had quietly expected him to fail.

Sometimes the answer was no. Claire learned to tick those as well though the mark occasionally took longer to make.

God had not promised to agree with her. He had promised to be faithful.

One prayer had survived almost the entire notebook.

Andrew.

Her younger brother had grown up in the same church as Claire. He knew the hymns. He knew the stories. He had once played Joseph in a Christmas presentation and had spent most of the evening trying to stop the tea towel on his head from sliding over one eye.

By twenty two he wanted nothing to do with any of it.

There had been no dramatic rebellion. No furious announcement. No great family argument.

He simply stopped.

First he stopped going to church. Then he stopped talking about God. Eventually if Claire raised the subject he would smile in the patient way people smile when an elderly relative has begun explaining something for the third time.

"I know what you believe," he would say.

"I know you do."

"And you know what I think."

"Mostly."

"Then perhaps we can save ourselves the annual summit meeting."

Claire would laugh because he was still her brother and because she loved him too much to make every meal an argument.

But she prayed.

Year after year she prayed.

Andrew married. Claire prayed.

His daughter Sophie was born. Claire prayed.

He changed jobs twice. Claire prayed.

Their father died. At the funeral Andrew stood beside Claire and sang none of the hymns. She prayed then too though the prayer had almost no words.

Lord, please.

That was enough.

The prayer moved from notebook to notebook.

Andrew. That he would come to Christ.

Beside it sat the little empty square.

At first Claire expected to tick it quickly.

Then she expected to tick it eventually.

After fifteen years she stopped thinking about the square very much.

After twenty years she started noticing it again.

It bothered her more than she wanted to admit.

Not because she thought God owed her an answer. She knew better than that. But there were Sundays when somebody gave a testimony about praying for a loved one and seeing them wonderfully converted. Claire rejoiced with them.

Then she went home and thought about Andrew.

There were books about persistent prayer. Sermons about asking in faith. Bible studies about the widow who kept coming to the judge.

Claire believed all of them.

Still the square remained empty.

One Tuesday morning she sat at the kitchen table with the notebook open and coffee going cold beside it.

Mark came in carrying two slices of toast.

"You are frowning at God," he said.

Claire looked up. "I am not frowning at God."

"Then the notebook has offended you."

She turned it around.

Mark saw Andrew's name.

"Ah."

"Twenty three years."

He sat opposite her.

"I know."

"Do you ever wonder whether I should stop?"

Mark took a bite of toast and chewed before answering.

"Stop praying for him?"

"Yes."

"No."

The answer came so quickly that Claire almost laughed.

"That was very decisive."

"You married me for leadership."

"I married you because you had a reliable car."

"It was a very good Corolla."

She smiled but only briefly.

"I mean it. Sometimes I wonder whether I have turned this into a test. If Andrew comes to faith then prayer worked. If he doesn't then what have I been doing all these years?"

Mark put the toast down.

"Praying."

"I know that."

"No. I mean that may be the answer to your question. You have been praying. You have been bringing someone you love before the Lord. You have been asking for something good. You have been refusing to give up on him. None of that becomes wasted because you cannot put a tick beside it yet."

Claire looked at the notebook.

"Yet."

"I said yet because I am an optimist."

"You support the Crows."

"Faith has many forms."

That made her laugh properly.

Later that week their pastor preached from Luke 18 about Jesus telling His disciples that they ought always to pray and not lose heart.

Claire had heard the passage many times. What caught her attention that morning was not the persistence of the widow.

It was the phrase not lose heart.

She had always treated persistence as a matter of discipline. Keep going. Do not stop. Stay at the task.

But losing heart was different.

Losing heart meant something inside you had begun to conclude that nothing was happening because nothing could be seen.

Claire knew that feeling.

She had mistaken silence for inactivity.

She had begun to treat the empty square as evidence.

Yet Scripture did not tell her that she could see all God was doing. It told her who God was.

He was not the reluctant judge in the parable. He was the righteous Father.

He was not irritated by her coming.

He was not short of mercy.

He was not confused about Andrew.

He did not need Claire to wear Him down.

Prayer was not a lever that eventually forced heaven to move. It was dependence. It was obedience. It was love brought before the throne of grace again and again.

That afternoon Claire opened the notebook.

Andrew. That he would come to Christ.

The square was still empty.

She left it that way.

Underneath she wrote three words.

Still praying. Still trusting.

Nothing dramatic happened the next day.

Or the next month.

Andrew did not appear at church. He did not telephone with a trembling voice and announce that he had finally understood the gospel. There was no music swelling in the background because real life is inconsiderate that way.

Nearly six months later Claire's phone rang while she was making dinner.

It was Andrew.

They talked about ordinary things first. Sophie's school. Mark's bad knee. A leaking tap Andrew had been meaning to fix for weeks.

Then his voice changed slightly.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Sophie has been asking questions about Jesus."

Claire turned the stove down.

"What sort of questions?"

"The sort I apparently used to know how to answer."

She said nothing.

Andrew continued.

"She asked me last night why Christians say Jesus had to die. I gave her an answer that sounded like something from a bad documentary."

Claire smiled despite herself.

"Would you like me to talk to her?"

"Maybe. But I thought I should understand it myself first."

There was a pause.

"Do you still have Dad's old Bible?"

Claire closed her eyes.

"Yes."

"Could I borrow it?"

Every part of her wanted to seize the moment. To explain everything. To turn one question into a complete evangelistic campaign before Andrew had time to escape.

Instead she said, "Of course you can."

"Don't make a big thing of it."

"I won't."

"Claire."

"I promise."

After they hung up she stood in the kitchen for a long moment.

Then she walked to the table and opened the prayer notebook.

Andrew's square was waiting.

Claire picked up her pen.

She did not tick it.

Not yet.

Instead she added another line.

A Bible asked for. Thank You, Lord. Keep working.

Then she closed the notebook and returned to dinner.

The answer had not arrived in the form she had imagined.

Perhaps it had not arrived at all yet.

But the empty square no longer looked empty.

It looked like a place where faith was learning to wait.