Tribute to my dear Ammachi (1924 – 2020)

Missed a valuable person today (22-04-2020) from the face of the earth. It was a grim reminder to me that death is inevitable. One day I too will face it.

Glory Maragatham was her name. She was born in a small town in TamilNadu, was married to Mr. Jacob, a made for each other couple. She was a teacher in govt high school in Karur and served as Headmistress in various schools in Tamil Nadu.  She has four children, 8 grandchildren, and 11 greatgrandchildren. God has blessed all of us abundantly. As listed in proverbs 31, she was a prudent woman, blessed by God to be a blessing to others.

All the grandchildren call her dearly ‘Ammachi’. She is close to all of us. She was really a prayerful woman, a devoted person, and a woman of faith. She was consistent in her faith life and prayed for all of us.

I still remember she is the one who taught me the old Tamil song Magizhvom Magizhvom for the first time during my school days when she came to our home at Ooty. She was a good geography teacher and taught me during summer vacations.

On every birthday of mine for several years, I remember she sends money-order through the post and with a postcard handwritten with lots of love and scripture promises. She remembers every need when we share with her and she prays earnestly with concern.

She loves eating sweets (poolipu mittai) and shares with us after every meal. She took care of me like a mother when I was working in night shifts in Bangalore. She checks on me whether I had food or not before I sleep. She was such a sweet and loving grandma I had.

How can I forget that she came to my wedding in 2012 to Hyderabad from Chennai and blessed me and Vasantha. We as a family cherish every moment spent with Ammachi. I could not even imagine how she could travel such a far with all her weaknesses. She is really a strong-willed person.

Thanks to God as we could recently visit her and spend time with her and sang songs with her. I still cherish her humor. With a grateful heart, I thank God for all these memories to recollect on this day. There are many more memories that I could not describe in my words. But I cherish those in my heart.

I learned about prayer from her life. To keep praying persistently to God even when the answers are delayed. Also, I learnt how important to intercede for others. One day personally she said to me I never pray for myself; I always pray for others. That really challenged me. 

Her life was well-lived. A simple and plain life. She was 96 when she entered eternal glory. She lived life to the fullest for God’s Glory as her name sounds. A good example to all of us. I salute her for leaving a legacy to our family. Let her soul rest in peace in God’s presence. One day I will see her in eternity. This is the hope of Resurrection for all those who die in Christ.

No Jesus -No Heaven; Know Jesus -Know Heaven. Amen!

Why our prayers go unanswered?

At times we don’t see answers to our prayers. We even feel sometimes lets not pray. At the end we try to conclude that our faith is so small and God is ignoring our prayers.

Below are the seven reasons as a reminder to check why our prayers are unanswered.

1. When we cherish sin in our hearts

Psl 66:18 “If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened”.

Jer 4:14 “O Jerusalem, wash your heart from evil, that you may be saved. How long shall your wicked thoughts lodge within you?

“Praying and sinning will never live together in the same heart. Prayer will consume sin, or sin will choke prayer” - JC Ryle

We battle with sin every day in our words, thoughts, and in deeds. Can there be a day in our lives without sin? As rightly said by Bishop JC Ryle sin chokes prayer. Sin and prayer are like oil and water and they cannot go together.  

Let us determine not only to confess our sins to God but also to renounce them to find God’s mercy (Prov 28:13).

2. When we turn a deaf ear to Gods word

Prov 28:9 “If one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination”.

When was the last time we implicitly obeyed the word of God in our lives? Today, we have lot of opportunities to hear Gods word through various ways. What is our response to Gods word? We read most of the time for sake of others, showing how much knowledge of the bible we can display. God demands obedience on our part, not mere knowledge. James 1:22 exhorts us to be doers of God’s word rather than mere hearers of His word.

3.When we pray with wrong Motives

Jas 4:3 “You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions”.

Our Motives could be sinful or self-centered. I know it’s quite difficult to analyze our motives every time we pray. Let us be conscious in the presence of the Lord not very careless with our words when praying. We often pray lengthy prayers for God to listen to us and our prayers seems to be unanswered. Let us pause for a while and give careful consideration towards our motives. May God heal our sinful and self-centered motives. 

4. When we are self-righteous and not humble before God.

Lk 18:9-14 “He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: ¹⁰ “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ ¹³ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ ¹⁴ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

The parable explains it all. Humility is prerequisite in our prayer life. Sometimes we are too proud to be humble and boast about ourselves like the Pharisee in this parable. God hates self-righteous attitude in our lives. Rather let us be clothed with Christ’s righteousness and Christ’s humility in our lives.

Let us learn to pray with humble hearts and set aside all our self-righteous attitude.

5. When we pray without Faith

Mk 11:22-24 “And Jesus answered them, “Have faith in God. ²³ Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him. ²⁴ Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours”.

One thing God admires in us when we pray, is our level of faith and not our fluency. Max Lucado says ‘It is not the quantity of words rather the quality of words’ that matters most in prayer.

God’s word reminds us “Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Heb 11:6).

Faith has become a rare commodity today. In Luke 18:8b the Lord tells when the Son of Man comes will he find faith on earth?

(You can read my earlier blog article on prayer – ‘Try these ‘add ons’ to your prayer life’) posted on 16^th Feb 2010.

6. When we have unforgiving spirit towards others

Mk 11:25-26 “And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses”.

We can offer lengthy prayers. We could be sound in our theology of prayer. But if we don’t have forgiving spirit towards others, it is not easy to get answers for our prayers. 

As we received forgiveness from God let us demonstrate our gratitude towards Him by forgiving others (Eph 4:32b).

7. When we rely on our own strength and not on God

2 chron 20:12b, 15b, 18a

Observe the following words of King Jehoshaphat:

“We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you.” (2 chron 20:12b)

King Jehoshaphat sets an awesome example to all of Gods people by completely depending on God and to trust firmly that the battle belongs to God (v.15b).

In v 18 – “Jehoshaphat bowed down with his face to the ground, and all the people of Judah and Jerusalem fell down in worship before the Lord”.

Is our life going without prayers? I would encourage you to make prayer your daily spiritual exercise. It is not just praying only during the time of crisis. Everyday let us come before God and have an appointment with Him. God loves to hear our prayers. What really hinders us to go to God in prayer? Is it our unanswered prayers? If then consider these reasons. 

Thank you. God Bless!

O' what a Day to Remember!

I recollect this day in the year 2001 how Christ made a difference in my life. I accepted Him as my personal Lord and savior (7.4.2001) through a simple way but it has changed my life’s direction and goal. As I look back from now, I don’t have any regrets in making that decision. He has always been faithful to me (1 Cor 1:9).  On this day I contemplate the joy I had that very night I received Him in my life. All I had was a simple childlike faith to go to Him and confess my sins and by faith received Him as my Lord and Savior.

In this brief post I like to share how I led to that decision on that day and how significant it is. So that if you have not received Him in your life, you can confess your sins and receive Him by faith as your Lord and Savior. Will you? Trust me you will never regret for making this costly decision.

As I was young and energetic youth I was so active in attending church meetings regularly and had many Christian friends, also went to lot of Christian camps but still my heart was far from God. I still haven’t surrendered my life to God. I attended a youth meeting in our church at Coimbatore on 7th of April. That very afternoon I have come to know how John Stott, a good Christian evangelical writer, received the Lord in his life during his school days.

I dropped the preacher after the meeting in my bike to the nearby stop. While driving the preacher asked me have you received Jesus in your life? I just nodded my head but deep within I know who I am. That very evening I started to search my book shelf and found a book named ‘Truth about Jesus’ by John Stott. I started reading this book because I heard about this man that afternoon. Coming to a particular chapter –chapter 10 – ‘Reaching a decision’, Stott expounds the verse Rev 3:20 poignantly. It meant a lot to me that evening. I believe I was convicted by the Spirit of God and I confessed my sins to Him and with tears received Him through faith. Truly it was joy filled night to me. I ran to share to one of my friend next day morning about my new spiritual experience. He too was excited and prayed with me. O’ what a Day to Remember!

I beseech every reader of this article to think about your own life. Have you received Lord Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior?

Delay not for making this decision. Your life will be safe in His hands. God has a good plan for your future (Jer 29:11).  

Don’t try Him, rather Trust Him in simple faith!

Our response to Covid19 - Fear or Faith?

Life in this trouble some days are fearful and uncertain. We are living in difficult times. Faith will be tested and proved and for some it could be shaken. On the outset life seems living on the edge crippled with fear. Where we are heading towards and what are we going to achieve in this world? “No one knows”. Till now we were all chasing after the wind. Now, Life seems to be still and meaningless.

We have faced uncertainties every time and it is filled with sorrow and questions.

Covid19 has taken the Center stage in the world arena. Everyone’s focus are now set on the statistics that corona brings into human history. The death toll is alarmingly increasing, and the hope of people were set on finding a way out from this menace. Living life amidst all these challenges makes us feel so weak and sick.

Eat, fun, celebrate are all have tossed up and have become not so attractive words to us. Fear has robbed our fun. Trust in God has lost its grip and self-reliance has taken its hold. Can God be trusted in difficult times like this? We trust the man-made hand sanitizers that can kill the germs. But truly do we trust in the everlasting, mighty, and faithful God and his promises? How can we beat the odds and trust God completely? Isa 26:3 says – “You will keep in perfect peace, those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you”. There is imperfect peace because of imperfect trust in God. Can faith be truly our antidote? There is a constant battle between faith and fear. It’s a critical choice that we need to make.

Jesus helps us to overcome fear. Do we allow him to take control of our lives? Do we know Him personally as our Lord and savior? He is the only hope to this dying world. It is high time for us to come to him and confess our sins and repent from our wicked ways. To receive his pardon and his mercies are we too far off? He is truly a prayer away from us, call unto Him and He will answer you. And let us find solace and rest for our troubled souls.

Let God who is Sovereign answer our cries in this crisis. Our lives are in His hands. He determines the number of days we live (Ps 90:9-12). Let us not be gripped by the fear of death. He can heal the Nations, as He is the God of the Nations. He can heal the people who are afflicted and restore peace and health in this world. The greatest of all healing is salvation of our souls. Amen!