Special Bowls

               My grandmother spoiled us, but I didn’t know it at the time. I simply thought this is what grandmothers did. She served salami on buttery crackers and a glass of cold milk at bedtime on a tray—in our own rooms no less. At her house I learned the delight of potato chips with ketchup. (Don’t laugh. How’s that different from fries and ketchup?) Of all my favorite treats at my grandma’s home, I still fondly remember popcorn presented in a colorful set of bowls—one giant bowl and smaller personal bowls. They were metal and all different colors—orange, yellow, green, and navy. Even today I wish I had a set of those bowls because of the warm fuzzies I get when thinking about popcorn at Grandma’s house.

                Although I’d like to have my own set of popcorn bowls, I’ve held on to the memory and done without them for at least fifty years. I don’t have to have those bowls, but there are some bowls that interest me far more. Even though I’ve never seen them, someone is tending these bowls, paying close attention to them because they’re important. Do you know about these bowls?

                In Revelation 5:8, the Apostle John writes:  “. . . the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb. Each one had a harp and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.” (NIV) You could get stuck on more than one part of this verse, but the part that always stops me is bowls of prayers.

                Often, because my mind wanders down more pathways than I can count, I write down my prayers in a journal. It helps me stay focused. At others times I pray silently or out loud, and my prayers speed away into the atmosphere around me and vanish at the speed of sound. Sadly, those prayers often disappear from my recollection as well. Honestly, there aren’t very many times I page back through my chronicled prayers either.  This passage makes me sit up and take notice. My prayers go someplace. They are collected. They matter in Heaven.  Whether I remember what I have prayed for or not, Heaven does.

                These bowls must be large, for they not only hold my prayers but the prayers of the saints—prayers of the saints of the centuries. Although I’ve read much about and practiced prayer during my Christian life, it still remains full of mysteries to me—why God wants to hear from me, how prayer on earth moves Heaven, just to name two. I don’t think I’ll ever understand it, but I don’t need to. It’s a beautiful thing to pray and know that the prayers of God’s children are so valuable to him that he collects them in Heaven in golden bowls. It makes me want to examine my prayers, to make them about extending God’s kingdom and making his name great, praying worthy of my father and his glory.

                What prayers of yours are going into those golden bowls?