I Believe in the Power of Prayer

This is a true story I experienced while on a teaching mission trip in Cuba several years ago:
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There was a pastor in Cuba who developed a friendship with a man who was a priest and practitioner of what the Cubans call Santeria, which is a kind of Cuban version of Haitian voodoo. The church started to minister to him and feed him because he was in dire straits. He was not a Christian and was clear to the pastor that while he appreciated the church’s help, that would not convince him to become a Christian. The pastor responded that while they would like for him to become a Christian, the reason they were assisting him was because he was in need and Jesus helped whomever was in need.

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One day this man in conversation with the pastor mentioned to her that he had a daughter in a town that was not nearby, but not too far distant either. He did not go into details, but several years before they had a terrible falling out and for several years she had since refused to speak with him or see him. In the meantime his daughter had a child and this man had never seen his granddaughter. The pastor said the she and the church would pray for a reunion so that he would see his daughter again and his granddaughter whom he had never seen. The man responded that he did not believe in her God, but that he appreciated the thought.

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The church began to pray. They prayed for two weeks, then for a month. They prayed for two months. They prayed for six months. One day, a young woman came to this man's door. He didn’t recognize her at first, but then he knew… it was his daughter. And standing next to her holding her mother's hand, was his granddaughter. For about six months the daughter had a heavy heart for the split in their relationship, and finally after six months, she could take it no more. She decided that it was time to renew her relationship with her father, and give her daughter a grandfather.

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After that first visit, the man was beside himself. The first thing he did was to rush over to that pastor's house and tell her what had happened. In the midst of the overjoyed conversation, the man said to her with tears in his eyes, "You know, I think your God did this."

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Indeed...