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For a looong time I've been praying for my dad, brother, and sister to find God (all three are atheists). My sister is a sophomore in college, and my brother is a freshman in college. This summer, I prayed that something - anything - would happen to them while they're at school that would help them find God. I mean, when you go to college, especially for the first time, I'm sure things are totally different then they were when you were in high school back at home. I just prayed that God would help them finally realize that they NEED Him, and that He is real and active and living in their lives.

TODAY, GOD ANSWERED MY PRAYERS! I'm still waiting to see what's going to happen with my brother, but today I learned something amazing about my sister. A few days ago, my mom told me that Rachel (my sister) is having a lot of friendship issues at school. Her roomate, who she's been best friends with since middle school, is being really rude to her for no reason. So my mom and I have been giving Rachel advice and helping her out a lot these past couple of days. My mom is a Christian, and she's been praying for my sister too. And she was telling me how she thinks Rachel is going to find God somehow through this situation...because when we're broken and alone, we realize we need Christ. And lately, Rachel has been extremely alone because her own roomate and former best friend won't even be nice to her. Her roomate is basically turning all her other friends against her too, so Rachel has pretty much no one to talk to her but her family. Today my mom told me that she told Rachel to try turning to God and try praying to Him for comfort and guidance. She said Rachel had actually tried praying before. At this point I was like, "WHAT?! She's atheist, how has she tried praying to something she doesn't believe in??" And my mom said that Rachel recently told my mom that she is AGNOSTIC! And trust me, that is a major difference from atheism. My mom said that she is actually open to God now!

So I was completely freaking out, and I immediately called my sister. We talked about random stuff for a little while, then I found a way to bring up religion. And she said she believes that there is a higher power, but she doesn't see the point of learning more about him or studying him or doing anything about it. I guess you could call her a "lukewarm" Christian. Well I've never been so happy to be able to call someone a lukewarm Christian! Usually we think of that as a bad thing because being a lukewarm Christian means you don't care about having a relationship with God. But I am SOOO happy that she is even that much! God totally answered my prayers! I mean, now that she's actually open to God, that provides so many opportunities for her to grow closer to him...I am so insanely excited to see what greater things God has in store for my sister!

So then I said something like this to my sister after she told me that's she agnostic..."Rachel you have no idea how happy I am to hear that you are open to God now! I know you say you don't feel the need to learn more about God or anything, but if you ever have ANY questions about anything just let me know...not to say that I'm wise and know everything about God, but I'm always here for you if you ever need anything." And she seemed really grateful after I said that! QUEST, THIS IS INSANE! This isn't the sister I've known all my life...the sister I'm used to is one that doesn't want to hear anything about my faith. Whenever I used to talk about my faith to her, she would say, "Haley, I don't want to talk about it." And I would always feel like I was forcing my beliefs on her, so I just wouldn't say much.

She also just told me that she had started believing in a higher power a few years ago...but this is the first time she's actually admitted that to me! All along I thought she was a hardcore atheist like my dad! And because she now admits that she believes means that she secretly wants to know more about God. Before, she believed in Him but completely blamed Him for everything that went wrong in her life, which is why she never wanted to talk about Him with me. Now things are different, and she is finding Him and learning more about Him and ADMITTING that she believes in Him when she is broken and alone.

Sorry this is extremely long, but this is probably the most important thing I've ever posted on here...what I learned today is that GOD ANSWERS PRAYERS. Never ever doubt that God can deliver. But when you pray (like it says in James), pray knowing that He WILL deliver. That's probably the main difference in the way I pray now...this summer, after camp, I started truly believing that God was going to answer my prayers. And he totally did with my sister! SHE IS SAVED!

If you have an advice on how I can minister to my sister now that she's admitted to being a lukewarm Christian, let me know! Or if you have any comments about this I'd love to hear!

Thanks for reading!
-Haley