MY FIRST INDISPUTABLE ANSWERED PRAYER

Danna Shirley

            Ron and I had only been Christians about seven months when we moved from Montgomery, Alabama to New Jersey. We were only there eight months when we moved to Ocean Springs, Mississippi. It was difficult for us as new Believers to get rooted and grounded in the Word of God until we finally got settled on the Gulf Coast and started attending Cedar Lake Christian Assembly (1981). 

            I made a few friends at church and quickly got invited to a Bible study on marriage. This was a powerful step in my faith walk with the Lord. I also met my “spiritual mother” at that time, Melody Martin. She was 18 and I was 32. We spoke on the phone every day as she discipled me in the faith. One of the things we had discussed was to be a witness for Christ unashamedly.

            The first time I really prayed a desperate prayer I received an awesome answer. We had bought a Sears chest freezer, which we kept in the garage, and since the kids played out there, I kept it locked. All my frozen meats and vegetables were in this freezer and the key was hung on a small nail inside one of the kitchen cabinets.

One morning as I planned what we would have for dinner, I couldn’t find the key to the freezer. I searched every cabinet high and low but to no avail. I called Melody and she told me to pray. But I didn’t know how to pray; Melody had always done all of my praying. This time I was on my own so I knelt down by my bed and asked the Lord to please lead me to that key so we could at least eat dinner that night. Then I went back in the kitchen and started searching again. Nothing!

            A few hours later a Sears truck pulled up in front of the house across the street with a delivery. I ran out and asked the driver if he might possibly have an extra freezer key. 

            “I doubt it, lady,” he said. “We don’t carry spares like that on us, but I can look in my toolbox.” As he dug around in all the nuts and bolts, he was surprised to find the perfect key. We walked in my garage and then he turned to me and said, “Now I can unlock yer freezer for ya, lady, but I can’t let ya have this key.”

            “That’s OK,” I beamed, “but I just want you to know you’re an answer to prayer.”

            I followed him out to his truck to thank him again. He opened his toolbox to return the key and then looked at me and said, “I’ve never been the answer to anyone’s prayers before. Here, keep the key,” and he laid it in my hand.

            God awesomely answered my prayer. The timing and conditions were just too synchronized for it to be coincidental. And by the way, I found my own freezer key in a coffee cup a week later.