Stay here and pray with me.

She annoys me. I can almost clock when the call will come...Friday afternoon, just shy of closing.
It's been an arduous day.  I just want to be finished and go home but, she knows this, and so the timing is deliberate-- call at the 11th hour and it will be easier to sway the narcotic from my hand; the panacea she desperately needs for the emotional pain buried under the guise of physical illness.
But compassion wins out, and I stay, and carry a sister with the comfort and encouragement she secretly seeks.

Don't hang up, but in the spirit;

Stay here and pray with me.

I pass him everyday on my way to work.
I guess his age to be about 16 though it's clear there is an impish innocence within.
Standing on the corner, backpack slung over his shoulder, father protectively near, he waits for the bus that will transport him to a place of cafeteria cliques, hallway hecklers, bathroom bullies, locker room pranksters,  impatient instructors and the ever existent, impenetrable circle of peers.
A place he won't fit in.
Will the academic microcosm be kind to this gentle, special needs boy-man today?
Please God, let someone be brave enough to claim him as friend!

Don't drive away, but in the spirit;

Stay here and pray with me.

My second story window gives me a birds eye view right smack into the family room of our neighbor across the street. Her husband died just recently; she's only 50 something.
I occasionally catch a glimpse of her walking the same linear path through a dimly lit house in the late evening.
Alone.
No one to even bring her a cup of cold water.
I ache for her.

Don't pull the blinds, but in the spirit;

Stay here and pray with me.

How is it I somehow envision God spiritually and tangibly absent until he is summoned?
As if it were me that happened upon the scene first.
As if it were my idea to pray.

Is it really about us petitioning God's presence, or God calling us to enter into His?

******

Where two or more are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

Matthew 18:20

He took care of them on EVERY side.  

2 Chronicles 32:22

Stay here and pray with me. 

Matthew 26:38