July 20, 2012. Richmond, B.C.
"Tonight .. we are young. So let's set the world on fire, we can burn brighter than the sun."
I'm guessing by now most of you either know this song, or have at least heard it somewhere before. But look at the lyrics again for a second—this time with the eyes of a child who believes a loving, all-powerful God is just waiting to do amazing things through them.
Could these be words to a worship song? Sung in response to who God is and what he's doing through us? Normally we don't sing songs like this in Sunday services, but recently we sang just these lyrics during worship in my church in Richmond. So now everyone in our church knows them, from the oldest down to the youngest. This is a story about some of the youngest, and how these lyrics are true for them.
We were in Richmond Centre mall last night when this song began to play. There were three kids with us: Kristen (12), Peter (11), and Nathan (?). Lisa, Elsie, and I were leading. We were on a treasure hunt—an ultimate treasure hunt, that is—if you haven't read Kevin Dedmon's book on the subject, basically we were following specific clues God had given us—our 'treasure map'—to find someone God wanted us to minister to—the 'treasure'!
Kristen and Peter both had treasure maps and Nathan was there to watch. Up to this point we had been following a trail of location clues around, from a jewelry store to a popcorn stand, and finally to the cosmetics section of The Bay, which was the only place we could think of to connect with the word Peter got, "Dolce & Gabbana".
We had begun our hunt full of expectation and excitement, but at this point we had to admit we were beginning to doubt whether would ever find our treasure. It would end soon. We were only allowed 25 minutes, and then we had to report back to the rest of the group.
So, with not much time, we headed into The Bay, when "We Are Young" began to play. "It's that song!" I heard Kristen say. The three of us were walking quickly ahead of the group as Lisa gave me directions—turn right, then left, to get to the cosmetics section. I had no idea whether anything was going to happen, but suddenly as the song began to play I felt the expectation build again.
"Are you ready?" I asked Kristen.
"Ready for what?"
"To burn brighter than the sun!"
But at first the scene looked much the same as before. We weren't sure if God was highlighting anyone there, and we thought about our treasure maps once again—we were looking for a caucasian (a rare find in Richmond, actually, which is mainly Chinese), pink shirt, white shoes, a bit heavy-set ... suddenly I saw two women that had passed by us earlier. At the time it seemed God was highlighting them, but they had moved past too quickly for us to talk to them, and we were still getting our bearings then. But here they were again, in a totally different section of the mall. I mentioned them to Kristen, and she agreed we should give it a try.
So Kristen, Peter, and I went over, and Elsie soon joined us as well. I explained that we were on a treasure hunt, and I asked the shorter woman if her name was Wendy ... no ... ok, well there was only one other name on our list: Mary. The taller woman's eyes lit up—"Mary is my name" she said. Then suddenly all the pieces fit together, and we realized it was her: caucasian, pink shirt, white shoes—she was our treasure! So we asked if she had any of the conditions on the sheet we were here to pray for, including knee or leg pain. She said yes, that she had been struggling with arthritis and that it was very painful to walk, but right now she was having trouble with pain in her back. So I told her we'd like to pray for her, asked if it was ok, and then told Kristen to go for it.
She did. She prayed the Father's love over Mary and prayed for her back. As she prayed, the power of God covered our little group so powerfully that the air around us seemed thick with it. It was beautiful. Kristen had asked Mary if it was ok to lay hands on her during prayer, and Mary said sure, but Kristen never actually did, she just called out the condition, commanding the back to be healed. I have to say I didn't have quite that much faith at the time, so I put my hand on Mary's knee, because that was the word on our treasure map, but Kristen prayed right where she was.
After the prayer, Mary (who turned out to be Catholic), told us how blessed she felt to meet us and receive our prayers, and told us she would pray for us. She said she was so encouraged to see children taking their faith seriously, and actually doing the stuff God was calling them to do. And of course we were encouraged and emboldened as well—for Kristen and Peter, it was the first time they had seen, let alone done, anything like this—it's quite an act of courage to pray for a complete stranger!
Oh, before we said our goodbyes Kristen asked Mary how her back was feeling—yes, the pain was gone!
