Long Distance Prayer

Ok, God's really emphasizing the prayer thing right now. Today I remembered an incident that happened about a year ago. I was massaging a particularly difficult and hard-harted woman, and while I worked I prayed for her. I prayed for God to touch her life. God told me, "I can't. She would never receive it. But she lets you touch her, so you'll have to do it for me." Now obviously God was touching her through me, but I got the point. People have never been particularly eager to go to God directly - they want someone with skin on. I think this is the biggest reason why God chooses to work through His followers even though we limit Him so much.
Anyway, since that time I've believed that I carry God's presence with me everywhere I go. That's why in Ghana I felt that God was holding those children as I did. But now I'm back home, and I felt that my hope for those kids (assuming another Christian never goes to volunteer at that orphanage) was that they would remember that presence and seek it for themselves. Let's just say today God blew that assumption right out of the water!
Today my pastor made a simple statement that has the capacity to change my life. He said we could wash the feet of others in our thoughts and with our prayers. How stupid of me to think that God is confined to physical space! I don't fully understand how this works, but God clearly showed me that when I pray for those kids, He is holding them through me even though I'm hundreds of miles away.
I can't express to you how I felt as I received this revelation. I can hold my kids! The kids I've been missing so much I can't even think about them. The kids I've been weeping for. God gave them back to me! If I could fully wrap my head around this, I don't think I'd ever stop praying. I'd never let them go!
You know what's funny? When I was the only volunteer at that orphanage, and when the kids were feeling especially cuddly, I had to employ a specially developed way of sitting that would allow up to eight kids to sit in my lap at once (don't ask!). But when I pray, I can hold all of them at once!
Just when I thought prayer was all about God and not about what I wanted, God showed me more.