The Circle Maker by Mark Batterson

My grandmother gifted me with the followup to this book first, a couple of summers ago. I read the book, “Draw the Circle” before reading this one. That was also by Mark Batterson and was structured as a 40-day thing to work through. While I enjoyed that book a lot I really appreciated the greater context that this book provided. I thought it was wonderful and incredibly impactful. This was something I decided to give to my Mom for her birthday so we could read together. It was crazy because my grandmother gifted her with the first book! Totally a God thing and she loved it just as much as I did.

This book convicted me early and often. This was a great reminder for me. If we pray for something that we can do, why pray? God doesn’t appreciate that, why would He?! Divine interventions are God’s specialty. The truth is, God wants to bless you in ways you could never imagine, it’s up to us to ask for those blessings.

Pg. 15, God isn’t offended by your biggest dreams or boldest prayer. He is offended by anything less. If your prayers aren’t impossible to you, they are insulting to God. Why? Because they don’t require divine intervention. But ask God to part the Red Sea or make the sun stand still or float an iron axhead and God is moved to omnipotent action.

Do you agree with this? Is this true for you? Odds are, it is. Have you defined your goals for life? The studies have shown that the large majority of people don’t even have life goals. Only a few people have actually thought about their life goals. Even fewer have actually created life goals with God.

Pg. 24, Then you need to keep circling until God gives you what He wants and He wills. That’s the goal. Now here’s the problem: Most of us don’t get what we want simply because we don’t know what we want. We’ve never circled any of God’s promises. We’ve never written down a list of life goals. We’ve never defined success for ourselves. And our dreams are as nebulous as cumulus clouds. Instead of drawing circles, we draw blanks.

Just like the genie from Aladdin, the genie is not going to answer vague wishes. Neither will God answer vague prayers. My prayers changed also. It’s no longer things like, God please bless this food into our bodies, it’s God please nourish us, fuel us, and lead us to accomplish a, b, and c as effectively as possible.

Pg. 27, The author, pastor of one of the largest churches in Seoul, Korea, wrote, “God does not answer vague prayers.” When I read that statement, I was immediately convicted by how vague my prayers were. Some of them were so vague that there was no way of knowing whether God had answered them or not.

The only thoughts in relation to this point from the author that I have are wow. That’s crazy to consider, to realize, and to truly pay attention to, it’s just wild.

Pg. 31, When I retrace the miracles in my own life, I’m amazed at how many of them happened outside the city walls. They didn’t happen during a planning meeting; they happened during a prayer meeting. It wasn’t problem-solving that won the day; it was prayer solving. I got outside the city walls and marched around the promise, around the problem, around the situation. And when you do that, it won’t just be the drawbridge that drops; the wall will fall.

I loved the revelation that the author had one day in his studies. The author, Mark Batterson, realized that God was not doing anything, it was already done. And today, at Lifework South Florida, one of the speakers emphasized what Albert Einstein said about relative time and how that connects to God. It means that God is past, present, and future all at once — simply I am.

Pg. 39, During devotions one day, one phrase jumped off the page and into my spirit:

“Now the gates of Jericho were securely barred because of the Israelites. No one went out and no one came in. Then the Lord said to Joshua, “See, I have delivered Jericho into your hands.”

Did you catch the verb tense? God speaks in the past tense, not the future tense. He doesn’t say, “I will deliver.” God says, “I have delivered.” The significance is there: The battle was won before the battle even began. God had already given them the city. All they had to do was circle it.

Loved this. Absolutely loved this. We don’t know what others are going through or what other people are dreaming for but we can be certain that they are dreaming for something and are seeking something great.

Pg. 41, I’m not sure what promise God has put in your heart. I don’t know what dream you’re holding on to or what miracle you’re holding out for, but I offer this exhortation: Keep circling Jericho. And don’t just pray through; praise through.

I just absolutely loved this story and also the reminder and clarity that the author was able to have. It’s one thing to have an incredible experience happen to us and quite another to be able to understand that a prayer circle drawn years earlier was answered and came to fruition in that moment. I have not experienced many moments quite like that one. But there was one. Recently I found a position at a company that was ideal for me. I had prayed and prayed for a position like that one and searched far and wide — or so I thought. When I went in to interview, I was a few minutes late and maybe wasn’t exactly where I should have been. However, I followed up in a very professional fashion, wrote a thank you note, sent a thank you email, and even created a short presentation to help target a project the CEO and COO identified as a point of interest. Needless to say, the next day I received an email and corresponding call with an offer. All glory to God, I was truly speechless also.

Pg. 63, “We want to give the church $3 million dollars.”

I was speechless. And I’m a preacher.

In the awkward silence of my speechlessness, I heard the still small voice of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit hit the rewind button and reminded me of a prayer circle that I had drawn four years before.

Let’s be honest, transparent, and authentic here. Even a pastor struggles with selfish prayers. I continue to think about the old adage, “If all your prayers were answered would it change your world or THE world?” The goal, of course, is to change the world, and not just yours.

Pg. 64, If we were absolutely honest, we would have to admit that most of our prayers have as their main objective personal comfort rather than God’s glory. If God answered those selfish prayers, they would actually short-circuit the purposes of God in our lives. We would fail to learn the lessons God is trying to teach us or cultivate the character God is trying to shape in us.

This is something that I am discovering more and more each and every day of my life. Oftentimes, I have been searching for answers, I certainly was when looking for a full-time role to complement the MBA. However, when I got serious about my relationship with God and focused time there, He provided the answer. Someone recently also shared a story about their company when they needed to find a new CMO. They had a limited amount of time and left it up to God. They sought God and spent hours in prayer each morning. God provided a person to them, the answer to the question they had, soon after. Now, that doesn’t always happen, but God will always reveal an answer to us if we are persistent and patient enough.

Pg. 65, If you seek answers you won’t find them, but if you seek God, the answers will find you.

The people were doubting God and His abilities. God wanted to show the people that He was the Creator and can always provide anything and everything. There is NO limit to God’s power and it’s important that we remember that. Jesus told us that if we tell a mountain to move in his name, it will move. As I continue to immerse myself in God’s Word and continue to learn from others, I strive to keep this as a main point of focus for myself. No matter what the circumstances look like, there is NOTHING that God cannot do.

Pg. 74, Moses was perplexed by the promise God had given him. How could God possibly provide meat for a month? It didn’t add up! But at the critical juncture, when Moses had to decide whether or not to circle the promise, God posted the question.

Is there a limit to my power?

When God prompted me to pray for a $2 million miracle, I had to answer the question. It seemed like an impossible promise to me, but to the God who can provide 105 million quail out of nowhere, what’s $2 million?

The size of prayers depends on the size of our God. And if God knows no limits, then neither should our prayers. God exists outside of the four space-time dimensions He created. We should pray that way!

It reminds me of the man who was sizing up God by asking, “God, how long is a million years to you?” God said, “A million years is like a second.” Then the man asked, “How much is a million dollars to you?” God said, “A million dollars is like a penny.” The man smiled and said, “Could you spare a penny?” God smiled back and said, “Sure, just wait a second.”

I had never heard that old adage and I’m glad that I hadn’t until this point, otherwise I might have believed it. We must always CIRCLE God’s promises, just as Jericho was circled in Joshua 6.

Pg. 94, “You’ve heard the adage: “God said it, I believe it and that settles it.” Here’s a fresh take on that old truth: God said it, I’ve circled it, and that settles it.

I paused. I reflected on this. I really thought about it. And I asked myself, is it any coincidence that my prayer life has been dramatically improved over the past 4 months since resuming my daily Bible reading? I don’t think so. I can now spend time praying and pray through verses. I can now repeat verses over and over and reflect on them deeply. In past times while praying I have praised God, thanked God, confessed to God, and asked God, but then I ran out of things to say. Now, I pray through the Bible and it’s all set and prayer is healthier than ever.

Pg. 96, One of the primary reasons we don’t pray through is because we run out of things to say. Our lack of persistence is really a lack of conversation pieces.

The solution? Pray through the Bible.

The paradigm shift happens when you realize that the Bible wasn’t meant to be read through; the Bible was meant to be prayed through. And if you pray through it, you’ll never run out of things to talk about.

And God did it with me when I needed a job and income flow. Just enough just in time… wow. God is incredible. Simply reading all that people have done is so spectacular and refreshing and inspiring. God is CONSTANTLY performing miracles for us.

Pg. 111, I have scribbled the initials JEJIT in the margins of my Bible at various places where God provides just enough just in time. He did it with the widow who is down to her last jar of olive oil. He did it when the Israelites are trapped between the Egyptian army and Red Sea. He did it when the boat is about to capsize on the Sea of Galilee because of hurricane-force winds. And He did it with us when we had twenty-four hours to come up with $7,500.

What a great reminder. I love the old adage, “Pray as if it is all up to God and work as if it is all up to you.” We need both. Just one will not be enough, we always need to act.

Pg. 114, Praying hard is hard because you can’t just pray like it depends on God; you also have to work like it depends on you. You can’t just be willing to pray about it; you also have to be willing to do something about it. And this is where many of us get stuck spiritually. We’re willing to pray right up to the point of inconvenience, but no further. Praying hard is uncomfortable and inconvenient, but that is when you know you’re getting close to a miracle!

People keep telling me to write my story, to write my book. I’m not sure what that looks like but I guess it’s time to get my feet wet. I’ll start taking a few steps into the river and progress forward. Updates to follow, sometime, somewhere, I’m confident I’ll either walk through to the other side or quickly learn to swim, either way, I’m following God’s lead.

Pg. 117, When the Israelites were on the verge of entering the Promised Land, God commanded the priests to not just look toward the sea but to step into the river. It’s one of the most counterintuitive commands in Scripture.

“When you reach the banks of the Jordan River, take a few steps into the river.”

Pg. 117, I don’t know about you, but I don’t particularly like getting my feet wet. I’d much rather have God part the river, and then I’ll step into the miracle. We want God to go first. That way we don’t get our feet wet. But it’s often our unwillingness to take a step of faith and get our feet wet that keeps us from experiencing a miracle. Some people spend their entire lives on the eastern shore of the Jordan waiting for God to part the river while God waits for them to get their feet wet.

There was recently a conversation I shared in, someone asked, “Hey when you are so successful, how do you continue to make sure that you are reliant on God and trusting Him above all else?” The answer was, there is no real answer. It’s intentionality, it’s reading the Bible, it’s prayer, and it’s so many different things for different people. But, this hit home, wherever we think we are proficient or capable on our own is exactly where we need to seek God more.

Pg. 121, Where do you feel like you need God least? Where are you most proficient, most sufficient? Maybe that is precisely where God wants you to trust Him to do something beyond your ability. It’s just when you think you have God all figured out that He pulls the coin out of the fish’s mouth. And it is God’s strange and mysterious ways that renew our awe, our trust, and our dependence.

I had not had this full realization before but then I thought about it and it’s totally true, it’s true for me and I’m fairly confident it’s true for you also.

Pg. 128, I’m so grateful that God doesn’t answer all of my prayers. Who knows where I would be? But part of praying hard is persisting in prayer even when we don’t get the answer we want. It’s choosing to believe that God has a better plan. And He always does!

God’s time. Something I have been focusing on more and more lately. It’s not up to us as humans when we receive certain things, it’s up to God. And often, when we think we are ready… we still aren’t ready. God will equip us with what He has promised. We may not see everything come to fruition during our lifetimes but as I read recently, prayer is the best legacy we can leave.

Pg. 137, We want our prayers answered immediately, if not sooner. But the key to dreaming big and praying hard is thinking long. Instead of thinking in terms of ourselves, we must think in terms of our children and grandchildren. Instead of thinking in seven-day cycles, we must think in terms of seventy-year timelines, as Honi the circle maker did.

I have this mindset in the gym, and when doing many other things also, the harder the better. It only makes sense that I would carry over this approach to my faith and prayer lives. If everything was just handed to us, we really wouldn’t have any reliance on God nor would we feel the need to rely on Him.

Pg. 144, Hiking the Inca Trail is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. It took four days to traverse a trail that was breathtaking because of its beauty and breathtaking because of its elevation. It was nearly dawn on the fourth day when we finally arrived at the Sun Gate and got our first glimpse of Machu Picchu. It has to be one of the most spectacular places on the planet to watch the sunrise.

By the time we arrived, the city was already swarming with tourists who had taken a bus to the top. It was easy to smell who was who.

That experience taught me something that is true in all of life: It’s not just where you end up that’s important; it’s how you get there.

The harder the better.

It’s true in life; it’s true in prayer.

I listened to his autobiography shortly after reading this. It was a great book and one that I really learned a lot from. I admire people who have built sustainable, long-lasting companies and Conrad Hilton is definitely a prime example. I didn’t know too much about the founding and building of this company but after I finished this book, I learned a lot and grew to admire the persistence he had and the vision for the company and overall organization.

Pg. 150, When Conrad Hilton was a young boy, his horse, Chiquita, died. He was devastated and demanded an answer. His mother’s answer was the answer to everything: “Go and pray, Connie… take all your problems to Him. He has answers when we don’t.”

The final section of Hilton’s autobiography is titled “Pray Consistently and Confidently.” Here Hilton provides a succinct summary of his approach to business — essentially his approach to everything in life: “In the circle of successful living, prayer is the hub that holds the wheel together. Without our contact with God, we are nothing. With it, we are ‘a little lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor.’”

The next time you stay in a Hilton, remember that long before it was bricks and mortar, it was a bold prayer. It was a long shot, a long thought. But if you pray like it depends on God and work like it depends on you for eighteen years, anything is possible.

Yes. From my experience, this has changed so much. I like what Denzel Washington said in one of his commencement speeches.

“Put Your Shoes Way Under The Bed at Night So You Gotta Get on Your Knees in the Morning.” — Denzel Washington

Pg. 152, Physical posture is an important part of prayer. It’s like a prayer within a prayer. Posture is to prayer as tone is to communication. Physical postures help posture our hearts and minds. All I know is this: Humility honors God, and God honors humility. Why not kneel? It certainly can’t hurt.

This has been an incredible morning routine that I’ve been building over recent months. I have started each morning with a gratitude list, prayer journal, goals journal, reflective journal, and a Bible reading/study. This is something that has really opened me up to so many things that I have never experienced before. The intentionality that I take and focus that I create because of that has been incredibly rewarding. We need to get in tune with God’s voice just as the author says we should.

Pg. 156, I believe in starting the day in God’s Word. It doesn’t just prime our minds; it also primes our hearts. It doesn’t just prime us spiritually; it also primes us emotionally and relationally. When we read the words that the Holy Spirit inspired, it tunes us to His voice and primes us for His promptings.

I love where science and spirituality intersect. It’s perfect and it’s something I can truly get behind and understand.

Pg. 156, Somewhere near the intersection of science and spirituality is a paradigm-shifting principle best seen in the priming exercise practiced by King David:

“In the morning, Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly.”

Prayer with expectation. That’s really all I have to say about this one. Just that there are so many things that we can ask for that God says He has already given. He told Joshua that He had given them the city, now it was up to Joshua to pray with expectation that the city would be delivered.

Pg. 157, I love the determination in David’s voice: “In the morning, Lord, you hear my voice.” That’s what it takes, doesn’t it? It’s hard to get up early, but that is what makes praying hard so hard. It’s the same determination I see in Daniel.

Then David declares, “I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly.” Most of us just wait; David waited expectantly. There is a big difference.

Consistency is essential and I love the way that the author made this a truly active action for all of us. It’s not enough to pray for a little bit and then call it a day, we must pray through.

Pg. 160, Drawing prayer circles is nothing more than laying our requests before God and waiting expectantly. If walking in circles helps you pray with more consistency and intensity, then make yourself dizzy; if not, then find something, find anything, that helps you pray through.

This is something I live by. This and, “How you do anything is how you do everything.” The first thing that God trusted each of us with is our mind and body. If we can obey God with those two things, how much more can we be equipped for what He has in store?

Pg. 170, If you obey God in the little things then God knows He can use you to do the big things!

I love all ten steps shared here. The first 2 are most essential and once put into action will streamline our goals. I’m confident that there are many things all of us do and wish for that are not God-honoring. Because of that, it is important to begin with prayer and then also check our motives. While all of the middle ones are important, I think that skipping the final 3 can be most detrimental. God can accomplish things in our lives in a moment that we may expect to take over 10 years. Without thinking long and dreaming big, we would be unprepared for what’s after we reach goals that we desired. I challenge you to take time to examine the goals that you currently have in your life and identify which of these areas of goal setting could be improved.

Pg. 181, Ten Steps to Goal Setting:

Goals are as unique as we are. They should reflect our unique personalities and passions. And we arrive at them via different avenues. But these ten steps to goal setting can guide us as we circle our life goals.

1. Start with prayer

If you set goals in the context of prayer, there is a much higher likelihood that your goals will glorify God, and if they don’t glorify God, then they aren’t worth setting in the first place. So start with prayer.

2. Check your motives

If you set selfish goals, you would be better off spiritually if you didn’t accomplish them. That’s why you need to check your motives. I stopped setting “getting goals” and started setting “giving goals.” All of our financial goals are giving goals because that is our focus. Our motivation for making more is giving more. After all, you make a living by what you get, but you make a life by what you give.

3. Think in categories

Another trick that has helped me is thinking in categories. My goals are divided into five categories: family, influential, experiential, physical, and travel. The obvious omission is a category for spiritual goals, but that is by intention. All of my goals have a spiritual dimension to them.

4. Be specific

Just like our prayers, our goals need to be specific. If a goal isn’t measurable, we have no way of knowing whether we’ve accomplished it.

5. Write it down

The beautiful thing about written prayers in particular and prayer journals in general is that you have a written record of your prayer. Too often we fail to celebrate an answer to prayer simply because we forget what we asked for before God answers!

6. Include others

I used to have a lot of personal goals, but I have replaced most of them with shared goals. Nothing cements a relationship like a shared goal. And God set the standard with the Great Commission. If you want to grow closer to God, go after the God-sized goal He set nearly two thousand years ago. I’ve also discovered that when you go after a goal with another person, it doubles your joy.

7. Celebrate along the way

When you accomplish a goal, celebrate it. When God answers a prayer, throw a party. We should celebrate with the same intensity with which we pray. One of my favorite Hebrew words is ebenezer. It means “thus far the Lord has helped us.” When you accomplish a God-ordained goal, it is an ebenezer moment.

8. Dream big

Your life goal list will include goals that are big and small. It will include goals that are short-term and long-term. But I have one piece of advice: Make sure you have a few BHAGs (big hairy audacious goals) on the list. You need some God-sized goals that qualify as crazy. Here’s why: big goals turn us into big people.

9. Think long

The sad truth is that most people spend more time planning their summer vacation than they do planning the rest of their life. That’s poor stewardship. Instead of letting things happen, goals help us make things happen. Instead of living by default, goals help us live by design. Instead of living out of memory, goals help us live out of imagination.

10. Pray hard

Goal setting begins and ends with prayer. God-ordained goals are conceived in the context of prayer, and prayer is what brings them to full term. You need to keep circling your goals in prayer, like the Israelites circled Jericho. As you circle your goals, it not only creates God-ordained opportunities; it also helps us recognize God-ordained opportunities by sanctifying our reticular activating system.

Our minds are incredible. This is talked about in books like “Think and Grow Rich”. “Welcome to the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, otherwise known as frequency illusion or recency illusion. This phenomenon occurs when the thing you’ve just noticed, experienced or been told about suddenly crops up constantly,” (Linked here). This is something that each and every one of us should be aware of as we continue to grow and become more in this life.

Pg. 188, The Reticular Activating System:

At the base of the brain stem lies a cluster of nerve cells called the reticular activating system. We are constantly bombarded by countless stimuli vying for our attention, and it is the job of the reticular activating system to determine what gets noticed and what goes unnoticed.

This is why goal setting is so important. It creates a category in your reticular activating system, and you start noticing anything and everything that will help you accomplish the goal. Prayer is important for the same reason. It sanctifies your RAS so you notice what God wants you to notice. The more you pray, the more you notice.

Agreed. It’s important to document things. If things change only 1% each day, that’s 365% each year. But… if we are not keeping track nor remaining aware of where we started, we might not even notice!

Pg. 189, In my opinion, journaling is one of the most overlooked and underappreciated spiritual disciplines. Journaling is the difference between learning and remembering. It’s also the difference between forgetting and fulfilling our goals.

I wrote in the margins on September 23, “This hit hard. I say that in the gym, I need to for prayer also.” I also typed this 5 months after I graduated. 8 months after I started searching for a full-time complement to the MBA program. I got a job offer in the afternoon that I wrote this. All glory to God. It’s crazy what can happen when we let God prepare us in the way that He needs to and then execute on what is in front of us. If it’s easy, we won’t grow. If we don’t grow, we can not do anything greater than what we already are…

Pg. 196, Until recently, I wanted God to answer every prayer ASAP. That is no longer my agenda. I don’t want easy answers or quick answers because I have a tendency to mishandle the blessings that come too easily or too quickly. I take the credit or take them for granted. So now I pray that it will take long enough and be hard enough for God to receive all the glory. I’m not looking for the path of least resistance; I’m looking for the path of greatest glory. And that requires high-degree of difficulty prayers and lots of circling.

Such a great reminder. This is something that we all need to be told sometimes. It’s as though God doesn’t know that a stressful week at work coupled with conflict at home would not upset us… of course He knew that we were upset and discouraged before we told Him.

Pg. 199, Sometimes we act as though God is surprised by the things that surprise us, but by definition, the Omniscient One cannot be surprised. God is always a step ahead, even when we feel like He’s a step behind. He’s always got a holy surprise up His sovereign sleeve.

Wow. This is incredible to us but just routine to God. Everything is His so nothing is too difficult or too much, everything is His.

Pg. 202, (As the author was searching for a new permanent location for the church after the theatres in Union Station in Washington D.C. closed). He wrote the following: Six months later, I felt prompted to ask Michael again if they would consider selling the church. Once again, he said no, but he also said, “Mark if we ever sell the church, we want you to have it.” Then in February 2011, I felt prompted to ask one more time. I honestly didn’t want to do it. For a third time, the answer was no, but Michael also said he would pray about it, and I knew he meant it.

Two days later, on my to Super Bowl XLV, I got a text from Michael telling me that God changed his heart. He felt it wasn’t just the miracle we had been praying for; he felt it was the miracle they had been praying for too.

On March 23, 2011, I met with Michael to sign the contract to purchase The Peoples’ Church. It had only taken them a couple days to find their piece of Promised Land on Branch Avenue, the main artery that runs through the heart of Prince George’s County in Maryland. Right as we were getting ready to sign the contract, their realtor called and told them that the owner had knocked $375,000 off the sale price of $795,000. ONLY GOD.

Just another amazing continuation of this story. It’s incredible. This was not even thought to be possible but with God, it is.

Pg. 203, We thought it would take at least three years to construct our new campus on the property that we had miraculously purchased at 8th and Virginia Avenue. Then God gave us a stepping-stone three blocks away: The Peoples’ Church. Here’s the great irony. Our phase-one auditorium was going to be an art deco theater. It’s almost like God said, “I’ve already built what you’ve dreamed of.” So God did in three weeks what we thought would take three years.

Long story short, a miracle for them + a miracle for us = a double miracle.

One footnote.

I wasn’t the only one doing a Daniel fast at the beginning of 2011. Michael Hall was doing one too! Coincidence? I think not. As I look back on it, the only way this double miracle goes down is if both of us had been fasting and praying. It was prayer and fasting that gave me the courage to ask him (Michael Hall) a third time if they would sell, and prayer and fasting gave him the courage to say yes. When Michael told me he would pray, he was in a season of fasting. I believe that his open mind was the result of an empty stomach. And when two people fast and pray like Daniel, it makes double miracles possible.

This is such an important verse. God is going to bless us if we show that we are to be blessed. Those who can be trusted with little will be trusted with much.

Pg. 210, I’m afraid that I will someday mishandle the blessings of God. Then I remember that I have circled Psalm 84:11: “No good thing does he withhold from those who walk uprightly.” All I have to do is stay humble and stay hungry.

This is something else that should always be conscious for us when we go throughout our days and our lives. This reiterates again to me the value of a prayer journal and documenting things so that the things that God does in our lives are more visible and recognizable to us. We may forget we even prayed about certain things — God doesn’t.

Pg. 219, God is great not just because nothing is too big for Him; God is great because nothing is too small. He cares about every detail of our lives. It’s not just the big answers to prayer that have inspired me; it’s the seemingly small answers!

This was the perfect way to end a book focused on prayer and living differently than we are currently. Prayer is incredibly powerful and I loved thinking about prayer as our legacy. Everything that we do can be undone by somebody else but the prayers that we pray have no expiration date. I love what God can and will do in all of our lives.

Pg. 224, I pray that you will make a difference while you’re living. But I also pray that you will make a difference after you die. And the way you do that is prayer.

Your greatest legacy is the prayers you leave behind. It’s also your longest legacy.

There is no expiration date on prayer. God will still be answering your prayers long after you are long gone. And the ripple effect will only be revealed in eternity!