Be anxious for nothing, but in
everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your
requests be made known to God.
Philippians 4:6
When I was teaching the kids to pray,
it amazed me the sincerity of children praying, when they “get God”
they have a confidence we as adults can forget to put into practice.
Sometimes I think, so often, we could be lost in-ourselves with out
the children, our seeing with the eyes of a child.
“The main purpose of prayer,”
writes Philip Yancey “ is not to make life easier, nor to gain
some magical powers, but to know God, to really know God.” To know
God not as some extra-dimensional power, some distant entity, but as
a being whose knowledge of us is intimate past all imagining, beyond
understanding. A God who knows us, as the Gospels proclaim, better
than we know ourselves.
Yancey finds that most of his struggles
in the Christian life circle around the same two themes: why God
doesn't act the way we want God to, and why we don't act the way God
wants us to. He writes, "Prayer is the precise point where those
themes converge."
If prayer is about a relationship with
God, perhaps it's no surprise that it is a roller-coaster of ups and
downs. "Prayer includes moments of ecstasy and also dullness,
mindless distraction and acute concentration, flashes of joy and
bouts of irritation. In other words, prayer has features in common
with all relationships that matter," he writes.
I can appreciated Yancey's rejection of
a "one-size-fits-all" sort of approach to prayer. Most
importantly, he calls us to relax. “There's no right way to pray.”
The only wrong way is not to pray at all. "Prayer is a way of
relating to God it should hardly surprise God that we respond in a
way that reflects our true self."
Prayer Starter:
Lord God, Thank you
for being with us in the good times and the bad, let us belight in
your presence, standing firm in your will, eager to share your love
to others......
Thoughts To Ponder:
The value of consistent prayer is not
that He will hear us, but that we will hear Him. ~William McGill
Prayer may not change things for you,
but it for sure changes you for things. ~Samuel M. Shoemaker
We have to pray with our eyes on God,
not on the difficulties. ~Oswald Chambers
The
Lord's Prayer may be committed to memory quickly, but it is slowly
learnt by heart. ---Frederick Denison Maurice
Reference Verses:
Eph 6:18
1 Tim 2:1
If you are looking for a good book on
Prayer this will enhance your Library:
Prayer HC: “Does
It Make
Any Difference?”
by Philip Yancey
