Some time ago I returned from a missions trip completely full of faith and ready to set the world on fire with the love of Christ. During my first church service back in the states I was asked to close our service in prayer. I joyfully obliged and went whole-heartedly into prayer full of faith and expectation. I asked God to keep us hungry for him, to grow our faith, and to keep us dependent on Him through every situation. I ended by exhorting our church into all God would have for them in the coming week - and it felt good. It felt empowered and right. I walked out of the pulpit and began talking with other members of the church, until I heard a distinct cry of pain. As a father I knew immediately the cry was coming from my own son, and I turned to see him clutching his right arm at the bottom of the stage in the auditorium of our church.
Amazingly - Not 15 minutes after I prayed this mighty prayer of faith my son had fallen off the stage at our church and broken his arm. We took him to the ER where we learned that our insurance had mysteriously lapsed, and that he had no coverage. The door opened to a long 3-month process of going back and forth between the hospital and the insurance provider trying to figure out what had happened and ultimately how we were going to cover the hospital bills. Not to mention my son's pain and frustration over being in a cast, having to cut his basketball season short, and trying to understand, "why God would let this happen to him."
All that to say, his arm healed and is just fine. The bills not only got covered, but both my kids ended up on a better insurance program that miraculously back dated to cover the accident. Through it all God provided - He sustained - and He answered my prayers over the church that Sunday morning. He just did it by using our family specifically and by keeping us dependent upon Him through circumstances that I could never have conjured up on my own.
My family now has another testimony of His goodness and all the more reason to pray bold prayers knowing that He will always come through even when it looks different then we'd imagined.