Praying Without Ceasing

By Andrew McChesney

Ning Cing’s two daughters wanted to go to a Seventh-day Adventist school when they arrived in the United States as refugees from Myanmar.

Image © Pacific Press

Eight-year-old Lun made it a matter of prayer during morning and evening family worship. “Please, God, help us,” she prayed. “We want to go to an Adventist school. If You want, You can help us.”

Nuam was only four and not ready for school, but that didn’t deter her. “Please, God, help us,” she prayed.

Their single mother, Ning, wished she had a choice other than public school in their new hometown in the state of Georgia. But she didn’t have money to send Lun to the Adventist school. She had other problems as well. She couldn’t speak English. She didn’t know how to drive. She had no job.

Then the headaches started. The pain spread to her left arm and left side. She lost sight in her left eye.

Ning wept. How would she care for her daughters, much less send them to Adventist school? As she cried, she read the Bible and prayed. “God, please answer my prayer,” she said. “Give me a miracle.”

Slowly the pain disappeared, and her sight returned. A warehouse offered her work, and an Adventist pastor drove her to the job interview. When she was hired, coworkers picked her up at the house and took her back. Then she learned how to drive. Her salary, however, was small.

The first school year ended, and Nuam was old enough to start first grade in the fall. Both daughters kept praying. When the new school year started, both girls entered public school. Still they kept praying.

“God, please help us,” Lun prayed. “Send kind, rich people to pay the school fees. We want to learn the Bible in school. We want to know You.”

Three weeks into the school year, an Adventist friend called. Funds from a Thirteenth Sabbath Offering would help cover the girls’ tuition at the Adventist school. “Your girls can start next week,” the friend said.

Lun was ecstatic. “Thank You, God!” she exclaimed. “You are able to do everything. You heard our prayers. We love You, God. We praise You.”

Nuam began to cry. “Oh really?” she said. “God really answered our prayers?”

The sisters woke up early, at 5:30 a.m., for their first day of school. They eagerly watched and waited at the window for the school bus to arrive.

“God is very great to my family and me,” Ning said. “He cares for us and loves us so much.”

Thank you for your 2011 Thirteenth Sabbath Offering that helped Ning’s daughters go to an Adventist school. This quarter’s offering will again help refugee children get an Adventist education in the North American Division. Thank you for planning a generous offering.

Produced by the General Conference Office of Adventist Mission.
Find more mission stories at adventistmission[dot]org

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Further Thought:

“When you find your work hard, when you complain of difficulties and trials, when you say that you have no strength to withstand temptation, that you cannot overcome impatience, and that the Christian life is uphill work, be sure that you are not bearing the yoke of Christ; you are bearing the yoke of another master.” — Ellen G.

Image @ Stan Myers from GoodSalt.com

White, Child Guidance, p. 267.

“There is need of constant watchfulness and of earnest, loving devotion, but these will come naturally when the soul is kept by the power of God through faith. We can do nothing, absolutely nothing, to commend ourselves to divine favor. We must not trust at all to ourselves or to our good works; but when as erring, sinful beings we come to Christ, we may find rest in His love. God will accept every one that comes to Him trusting wholly in the merits of a crucified Saviour. Love springs up in the heart. There may be no ecstasy of feeling, but there is an abiding, peaceful trust. Every burden is light; for the yoke which Christ imposes is easy. Duty becomes a delight, and sacrifice a pleasure. The path that before seemed shrouded in darkness becomes bright with beams from the Sun of Righteousness. This is walking in the light as Christ is in the light.” — Ellen G. White, Faith and Works, pages 38, 39.

Discussion Questions:

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