Fabrice Muamba

Last week, Fabrice Muamba collapsed during a football game, with a cardiac arrest. He was dead for 78 minutes, but was rushed to hospital, and is now recovering well, sitting up and talking. All of which is very good for him, and clearly shown the importance of getting treatment urgently.

However, there has been, since that point, calls to Pray for Muamba, by the family initially, and others since. It shows something else, I think. There has also been criticism of this too, at the very least because there are more important things for God and prayer to do.

Surveys in this country indicate declining belief in God, declining church attendance, a general declining level of defined spirituality. But the Pray for Muamba campaign seems to have taken off and been seen on football players shirts and on the front page of the Sun.

I think this is cool. Because I think that, whatever else we believe or don't believe in this country, we still think that prayer has an effect. His incredible recovery might seem to indicate that it actually works.

Actually, prayer works, and it works in all sorts of ways. It does, I believe, encourage God to intervene. But it also encourages us to do something, to change, to act to fulfill our prayers. And real prayer is about listening to God, and hearing what he has to say too - that will change us.

We are a nation who will pray, and prayer works. But prayer works as much to change us as anything. To listen to Gods desires and priorities. To drive us to make a difference. It may be illegal to advertise that God can heal, but God answers prayers. Just not always in the way we want.

Sorry I have been slow in blogging, BTW. I have been working on getting my book ( see side menu ) published. It is called Bubbles, and is written by Schroedinger. It is currently available in e-book format, on kindle, and in good old-fashioned paper.