Prayer

In trouble? Desperate? Exhausted?

“When we come to the end of ourselves, we come to the beginning of God.” – Billy Graham

There are appropriate times for long prayers. Sometimes we plead with God for something or we pray and then spend time listening for a response. But there are other times when a short prayer will do just fine.

Remember when Jesus was walking on the water at night and in the middle of a storm? When Peter realized it was Jesus, he asked if he could walk on water, too. Jesus invited him to come. Once out of the boat, Peter experienced the ferocity of the storm, and he began to sink. He was in trouble. He prayed, but he didn’t start with worship or confession of sins. He just cried out, “Lord, save me!” (Matthew 14:30). Charles Spurgeon, commenting on this passage, says that when it comes to prayer, “Not length, but strength is desirable.”

There are other short prayers in the Bible, too. There was a Canaanite woman who approached Jesus about her daughter who had a demon. After their discussion, she pleaded, in desperation, “Lord, help me” (Matthew 15:26). And he did.

And way back in Israel’s history, we find Nehemiah, working relentlessly with many others rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem. While he worked, he was being taunted and threatened. He pushed on with the project, sending up this urgent prayer, “. . . O God, strengthen my hands.” The taunters were rebuffed, and the wall was finished in just fifty-two days! (Nehemiah 6:9b)

God hears all kinds of prayers, whether read from a liturgy or conversational in format. But, when we’re in trouble or desperate or exhausted, a short heartfelt prayer will do. Just call out to him!

“The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” – James 5:16b

Getting Ready to Hear from God

“. . . in the liturgy from the past, I am reminded that wisdom from God has been around a long time. My words aren’t revolutionary. I can be helped by my brothers and sisters from the past. . . the words penetrate. They break away the hardness of my morning heart and get spiritual warmth pumping through my veins, showing once again it’s worth persevering in this liturgical pursuit, this routine.”* – Matthew Molesky

It’s a chilly morning. For the first time in weeks I reached for a sweatshirt before I sat in the chair with my Bible, pen, and fresh cup of coffee. Then, with my body warm and comfortable, I began to address my heart.

Do you, too, sometimes find you need to warm your heart before you’re ready to hear from God?

My heart gets ready when I read from the writings of Christians in ages past who had a longing to know God, feel his presence, and follow his direction. Some have written memoirs or left diaries or devotionals that give us windows into their hearts. The spiritual journeys of others can inspire our own desire to grow.

Here are a few of my favorites (would love to see yours in comments!):

Pursuit of God, A. W. Tozer

The Practice of the Presence of God, Brother Lawrence

The Normal Christian Life, Watchman Nee

Morning and Evening, Charles Spurgeon

My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers

After I read a short passage from one of these authors (or others like them), my heart is ready to turn to the Bible and to respond to its Spirit-guided message for today. The warm-up time is worth the effort!

Thus says the Lord: “Stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is; and walk in it, and find rest for your souls.” – Jeremiah 6:16a

Now’s a good time to pray.

“A man may study because his brain is hungry for knowledge, even Bible knowledge. But he prays because his soul is hungry for God.” – Leonard Ravenhill

Do you have any soul hunger going on? Wanting to know God better. Wanting to feel his presence. It’s likely he is the one putting that desire in your heart. When it comes, respond. How? By praying. When we pray, we reach out to connect, knowing he’s already reaching out to us.

Why the urgency to pray now? If you’re busy, it seems OK to wait until later to pray, right? Or if you are distressed about something, it’s hard to focus on prayer. God must surely understand that!

Here’s what David says to God in Psalm 32 “ . . . let everyone who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found” (verse 6). Personally, I don’t think God will go into hiding if I don’t pray right away. That would not be consistent with everything else we read about him in the Bible. Instead, I think the danger of not “finding” him when we pray may lie with us as the pray-ers.

Maybe we need to pray before we get distracted with the the things around us and forget to get back to him. Or before we make decisions without his guidance and find ourselves not wanting to reach out for help. Or before we get accustomed to moving through life without him. God doesn’t want that to happen to us and neither do we. So, the antidote to “losing” God through distraction, stress, mistakes, or just hard heartedness is to pray now. Now, while our hearts are drawn toward him.

Got a minute? How about using it to talk to God?

“Pray all the time.” – 1 Thessalonians 5:17 (The Message)

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It will make sense – eventually.

“God will not permit any troubles to come upon us, unless He has a specific plan by which great blessing can come out of the difficulty.” – Peter Marshall

Why? is a question we find ourselves asking a lot. Why doesn’t God heal me? Why can’t I find a good job? Why aren’t my prayers being answered? Why, God?

Sometimes there are identifiable answers to those why’s. Maybe we’ve made bad decisions and need to correct them. Maybe we’ve wandered from God and need to reconnect. But, at other times, we sense there’s more to the story than what we see.

When Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey at the beginning of the week of his crucifixion, the disciples watched, and John says they “. . . did not understand these things at first, but when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him and had been done to him” (John 12:16). They didn’t understand because they didn’t have the whole story – yet.

Later, just before the disciples and Jesus had their last Passover meal together, Peter objected to his Lord washing his feet. Jesus responded, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand” (John 13:7). In other words, just wait until you see how this ends. Then it will all make sense!

Sometimes we can understand the here and now only in light of what happens later. This requires trust that God is good and loving and powerful and will not allow our suffering to go unaddressed. Our cries are heard and our why’s will be answered – when we see how the story ends.

 “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen.” – 2 Corinthians 4:17-18a

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My House

“To think his thoughts, to choose his will, to love his loves, to judge with his judgments, and thus to know that he is in us, is to be at home.” – George MacDonald

How’s life at your house? I thought it interesting recently to read about the building of the temple in Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 1-7). It was beautiful, and it became the place where God chose to show himself to those who would worship him there. In Solomon’s dedicatory prayer, he sees it as a house of confession, worship, prayer – and also of celebration, feasting, and music. Fast forward to the New Testament, where Jesus enters the temple, God’s house, and says, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations” (from Mark 11:17).

Don’t we want that at our houses, too? A place where God shows himself present to instruct, affirm, correct, and lead. A place where we pray and can worship him in the quietness of the morning. A place where God is honored. Then, too, a place of fun, feasts, and, music.

What about your house? Whether it’s cabin-sized or temple-sized, is it a house of prayer? A house of celebration? A house filled with music and joy? Martin Luther said it this way: “The whole world could abound with the services to the Lord . . . – not only in churches but also in the home, kitchen, workshop, field.”

Let’s make our homes places where God is recognized, honored, and worshipped. It can change everything.

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. – Colossians 3:16-17

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Practice on Humans

“. . . anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. (I John 4:20b)

We can’t see God. Or sit across the table with him. Yet we are told that the greatest commandment is to love him and the second is to love our neighbors. I wonder if it has to be in that order.

Praying about loving God one morning, a thought came that I believe was from him: “Practice on humans.”

Maybe it is easier to love someone we can look in the eye, or touch, or hear. And maybe loving humans better will help us love God better, too.

We can start with those who are easy to love – babies and small children. Right? Then other family members, people at work or in the neighborhood. The next step is when God asks us to love someone who is dirty, angry, clingy, selfish, or arrogant. We start with those we can love easily, and then God moves us on to bigger love challenges. When we accept those challenges, allowing God’s love to flow through us, we become better lovers and, as we do, we find our love for God and love for human beings are closely intertwined.

Mother Teresa was ministering to lepers one day when a visiting American businessman saw her put her arms around a sick and very dirty man. Cringing, the American visitor commented to the person with him, “I wouldn’t do that for all the money in the world.”

Overhearing him, Mother Teresa responded, “Neither would I. But I would do it to show him the love of Jesus.” She had mastered the love lessons. Let’s find someone to love today!

“Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.” – Mother Teresa

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The Every Day God

“My mouth is filled with your praise and with your glory all the day”. – Psalm 71:8

As I’m writing this, it’s Sunday morning. God’s day. Going to church on Sunday is good! But, it’s even better to make every day, all day God’s day. I don’t mean we should sit, pray, and read our Bibles all day. God wants us to live our actual lives – family, work, play – all of it.

But, what if, while we were living our daily lives, we invited God to be with us? What if we acknowledged his presence by talking to him – as we drive to work, shop for groceries, or relate to others?

“Spiritual people are . . . those who draw their life from a conversational relationship with God” (Dallas Willard). When we have an ongoing conversation with God, he enlivens us, energizes us, gives us true life. We become aware of what pleases him, are a little bolder in sharing our thoughts about him, and find our hearts softening toward those around us. Then, little by little joy creeps in. When I talk to God more, I smile more, too!

What can you talk to him about? Here are a few ideas from Psalm 71:

Tell him when you don’t feel safe: “Be to me a rock of refuge to which I can continually come.” (v. 3a)

Praise him for who he is: “My praise is continually of you.” (v. 6b)

Talk to him about your dreams: “I will hope continually.” (v. 14a)

Thank him for something he did for you: “My tongue will talk of your righteous help all day long.” (v. 24a)

The more we talk to him, the more natural it feels. Life gets a new dimension – God’s perspective, direction, companionship. Amazing, really!

“Prayer is talking with God about what we are doing together.” – Dallas Willard

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What I Can’t Do for Myself

“Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God,” – 2 Corinthians 3:5

If God loves us, has all the resources in the world at his disposal, and is almighty, we should be living lives of ease, right? Just ask and he will deliver what we need. Kind of like Amazon.

Yet, we know it doesn’t work that way. God invites us to tell him our needs, but he often asks us to participate in answering our own prayers and sometimes even our prayers for others. If we’re sick, we pray for healing, but we also see a doctor, take the medicine, and get rest. If we’re in financial need, we ask God for direction and help, but we also work with diligence and spend with discretion. And if we pray for a friend in need, we might also lend a hand.

God enables us, partners with us, and blesses our efforts. He knows that is better for us than simply giving us everything we ask for. Maybe our prayer should be more like this:

“Dear Lord, please do for me what I cannot do for myself.”

When we pray that way, we begin to realize there are some critically important things only God can do. Only he can direct our paths, protect us from the evil one, forgive our sins, and give rest to our souls. Every one of these things is foundational to our physical, spiritual, and emotional well-being and, try as we might, we cannot do them for ourselves.

Sometimes, though, when he thinks it best for us, he steps in to heal, provide, or give special wisdom. Only he knows when and how to intervene. That’s why we trust him.

“Our quitting point is God’s beginning point.” – Woodrow Kroll

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Bold Prayers


“Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” – Hebrews 4:16

Do you pray wimpy prayers? Sometimes we all do. Prayers that are routine – people we want God to bless, safety for our children, good weather – you know the kind I mean. Not that these prayers are unimportant, but if that’s all we pray about, we’re missing something!

At least 1/3 of the psalms in the Bible are classified as laments. The writers are crying out to God asking him to wake up, to act, to strike enemies, to remember his people. These psalms are raw, honest, and bold. And God responds – in his own way and time.

So, what do you want to ask for? Do you need God’s comfort? Ask him. Or his forgiveness? He’s just waiting for you to ask. Who do you want God to chase after like the hound of heaven? Do you want to tell him about your frustration about unanswered prayers? Or talk to him about what’s making you sad or angry? Go ahead. Be confident. Pray as you’ve never dared pray before.

When we do that, we find out something: Praying boldly energizes us, fills us with strength. Confident prayers inspire faith, causing us to be on the lookout for answers we hadn’t had the courage to look for before. Bold prayers remind us that God is the only reliable source of our rescue or provision.

So what are we waiting for? Let’s start praying in a whole new way – with confidence and boldness. God wants to hear the honest cries of our hearts.

“He already cares about the things we pray about . . . He has simply been waiting for us to care about them with him.” – Philip Yancey

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Lost?

“He fulfills the desire of those who fear him; he also hears their cry and saves them.” – Psalm 145:19

We all wander away sometime. We don’t intentionally turn our backs on God, we just stop paying attention to him. We get distracted and, eventually we stop following where he leads.

When a sheep does that, he gets lost. And a lost sheep has no way to find his way back home. So he usually finds a bush or a rock to lie against and he waits to be found. In the meantime, the shepherd has returned from the fields to the sheepfold for the night and, in his counting, realizes that one of his sheep is missing. By now, though, it’s dark and that little sheep will be hard to find. But, the shepherd lights a lamp, ventures out, and begins the search, calling as he goes.

At this point in the dark of night, the sheep will never be found unless he participates in his own rescue. His job is to hear the shepherd’s voice and then respond with a bleat – as loud as he can and consistently over time until the shepherd can follow the cry and bring back the wanderer who, by now, is cold, hungry, and afraid.

Are you feeling lost today? Far away from God? Having no way of knowing how to find your way back to him? He’s reaching out for you already, but he waits for you to participate in your own rescue. How do you do that? You call out to him. You pray. You wait for him to hear your cry for help. He will come. He will rescue you and carry you home.

“Human beings do not readily admit desperation. When they do, the kingdom of heaven draws near.” – Phillip Yancey

Note: Lost sheep concept taken from the book The Good Shepherd by Kenneth E. Bailey