My jeans pocket is bulging with treasure! The back of my closet, a sidewalk, and the garage floor were sources of this unlikely treasure—three precious pennies. Monetarily, they are not enough to buy one Atomic FireBall , but, even so, these pennies pack a punch as powerful as the fiery jawbreakers.
My brother Richard recently shared with his congregation how God interrupted his life using a solitary penny. Over five years ago, while walking across a parking lot, Richard spied a penny, and felt prompted to pick it up and say a prayer. After praying about what came to mind, the Lord impressed upon him to pick up every penny that he saw from then on out, and say a prayer.
As Richard obediently stooped, and sometimes knelt, to pick up pennies and pray, he underwent a “philosophy adjustment.” Previously, he held that abandoned pennies were not worth the energy required to scoop them up. He began to understand that God was using a “small thing” to illustrate a big truth found in 1 Thessalonians 5:17—“pray without ceasing.”
“Penny Prayers,” Richard said, “are prayers in waiting.” He explained that they are a form of communication that can be compared to switching between two telephone calls with the aid of the “call waiting” feature. Call waiting enables one to temporarily suspend a current telephone call in order to quickly handle a second one, and then return to the first caller. Yes, handle the day-to-day activities—waiting in lines, walking across parking lots, standing at street corners—all necessary interruptions or distractions of life, but quickly return to that primary, on-going conversation with God. Pennies are a reminder that God is on the line, waiting to resume the conversation.
Picking up pennies and praying is exercise—an exercise in faith. Richard described finding pennies in disgustingly filthy places, and picking up 30 or more pennies at one time. He figured that pennies plucked out of the worst environments indicated greater prayer needs, while an abundance of pennies showed that our opportunities to pray are endless.
Dick, one of Richard’s friends, incorporated Penny Prayers into his daily routine. Several weeks ago, Dick presented a jar of treasure to Richard, saying, “Many of these pennies represent prayers for you and your family.”
Richard challenged his church family to use small things to keep them in a continual prayer line with God throughout the day. Simple sentence prayers about a job, marriage, or a child, are real and powerful.
Penny Prayers are, indeed, atomic fireballs of power.
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Click to hear Richard’s sermon “Small Things : : Developing Your Prayer Life”
🙂 i love this! i pick up pennies and change anyway, but never with purposes other than to fill my change jar. this is really cool and imma start doing it!
This is a very smart way of keeping a close connection with God. I like this a lot. Very smart and very noteworthy.
i too like it that you have written about the lowly penny. many years ago, tina watched joyce myers on her television program and reminded us that on every penny, it says “In God We Trust” so while it still won’t buy an atomic fireball, it still has a Godly reminder stamped into it. joyce myers also asked us to pray each time we picked up a penny. tina saves every penny until she has filled her jar, then takes them to the bank and cashes them in, then sends that money to the “Joyce Myer Ministries” . boyd
🙂 I love what Tina does with pennies! I also like Joyce Myer’s teaching, and have learned a lot from her ministry.
I’m especially glad that our coins have “In God We Trust” stamped on them. It will be a sad day if that phrase giving allegiance to God is removed.
Yay for Penny Prayers!
Many people today think pennies are useless. One day I was delivering a meal to one of our people on the Meals on Wheels route. A little black boy was playing outside near the street where we parked. I saw a penny just as I was getting the meal out of the car and I pointed it out to the little boy. I asked him if he wanted to pick it up. He said, “Nah, I don’t want it.” I picked it up. The next time something like that happens I think I will know something to pray about and hopefully will do it. Maybe I won’t be like the little boy and say, “Nah, I don’t need it”
I love this sermon and penny reminder. I believe I’ll reinstate the penny prayer into my life and find a worthy cause or person to pass the pennies on to.
I said my first penny prayer this morning and am going to adopt Tina’s and Susan’s idea to collect the pennies and then give them to a worthy cause.
All of us, including Mr. Richardville, are grateful to Richard for sharing such a good way to integrate prayer into everyday activities.
At our house, we are also praying penny prayers, and considering which organization to donate the money to.
I found a penny this morning as I was putting my purse into the locker at Health Trends. I picked it up and told the person who was there about Richard’s Penny Prayers. She thought that was a neat idea and said I need a reminder to pray. I said a private prayer for her.
I knew that I liked the idea of penny prayers for myself, but now I see that they are also a good way to share with others about prayer. Thanks, Aunt Margaret, for showing us what a penny prayer in action looks like.