She Prayed for Five Years to See if God Was Real
By Andrew McChesney
Viona Boro first realized in the third grade that she wanted to sing.
Viona lived with her grandparents on the island of Ronglap, a patch of land covered with coconut trees and breadfruit trees in the Marshall Islands.
She loved listening to her grandfather sing about Jesus in the Marshallese and English languages. Grandfather would sit under a breadfruit tree beside their home and, playing his ukulele, sing “Jesus Loves Me,” and “God Is So Good.” Sometimes at night, Viona would lie on the ground outside and look up at millions of glittering stars as Grandfather sang, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.”
Viona sang, too, but she sang very quietly. She didn’t like her voice, and she was concerned that other people might hear her.
She didn’t know much about God, but she had heard Grandfather sing that God answers prayers. So, she decided to find out if God was real by asking for a good singing voice.
She didn’t know how to pray, so she simply spoke to God in bed at night.
“What can I do to help my voice become better?” she asked.
The next night, she asked God again, “What can I do to help my voice become better?”
She prayed this prayer many times as she finished third grade at the local public school, and nothing happened. She persisted in the fourth and fifth grades. “What can I do to help my voice become better?” she continued to ask. Still nothing happened.
Viona grew angry, and she wondered whether God was real. But she refused to give up. She kept praying.
Three years passed. Viona continued praying, “What can I do to help my voice become better?”
When she was in the eighth grade, she was invited to join a church choir. She and other choir members spent hours rehearsing songs for the church service. “I practiced all the time,” she said.
Then one day, she noticed suddenly that her voice had changed. It was beautiful.
“I was like, ‘Whoa! Where did that come from?’” she said. “I said to myself, ‘This is a miracle, and God is real!’”
Two years later, she enrolled in the Ebeye Seventh-day Adventist School. During a school week of prayer in 2016, Viona accepted Jesus as her Saviour and chose to be baptized. She is the first Seventh-day Adventist in her family. She loves to sing and play the ukulele for school worship, and sings to her grandfather over the telephone. The first time she sang, Grandfather exclaimed, “Wow, you sing well!” Viona told him that her beautiful voice was an answer to prayer. She tells everyone that God is real and answers prayer.
Andrew McChesney is editor for Adventist Mission. This story is being reprinted with permission. The original story can be read here.
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World Church Prayer Requests
for Oct. 15-22, 2017
• PRAISE REPORT: Thank you for praying for the Annual Council fall meetings. God blessed everyone with a good spirit, and He guided the discussions. There were many powerful and inspiring reports shared about how God is working around the world through Total Member Involvement. The presentations inspired and encouraged many leaders as they return home to their fields of service.
• PRAYER REQUEST: Please pray for church leaders as they return from Annual Council to their home divisions around the world. They will now conduct their year-end division meetings. Perhaps consider hosting a personal week of prayer on behalf of your home division leadership during these coming days as plans are being made to advance the mission of the church.
• PRAYER REQUEST: Please pray for the upcoming “Reformation Seminars” that are being held in multiple locations around the United States as we near the 500th year anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. Pray that many will be brought to a clear understanding of Biblical truth and recognize the significance of current events.
• PRAYER REQUEST: Please continue to pray for our brothers and sisters around the world who are trying to put their lives back together after surviving multiple hurricanes, fires, tornadoes, and earthquakes. Pray that many come to a saving relationship with Jesus as they look for hope in the midst of despair.
• PRAYER REQUEST: Continue to pray for the world-wide refugee crisis. Those in camps in the Middle East are probably suffering most, but refugees everywhere are struggling to survive. Let’s pray that God shows us how to reach out to refugees in our area. (For information on how to effectively minister to refugees, visit: reachtheworldnextdoor.com)