Hear my cry, O God; listen to my prayer. This is the opening sentence to Psalm 61, one of the many prayers of David found in the Bible.
I don’t know about you, but I have mixed feelings when it comes to praying. I find it to be both easy and difficult.
Sometimes my prayers are brief and to the point: “Help me, God.” I simply say. Or, when praying for someone I know who is going through a great struggle I frequently pray: “O Lord, give _______ grace to make it through this day.”
There are no magical formulas when it comes to prayer. We must keep in mind that prayer is not a way of manipulating God into giving us what we want. Prayer is pouring out our hearts to God and then trusting Him to answer according to His good and perfect will.
As I mentioned, I find prayer to be both easy and difficult. This might sound strange for a pastor to say. To be honest, I don’t find it easy to stop and pray. For this reason, I have found it useful to make prayer a part of my daily routine. I pray in the morning; these are usually very brief prayers. I also pray with my wife in the evening, just before turning in for the night. For years we prayed on the couch. There were more than a few times when one of us had to nudge the other after they had fallen asleep during our prayer time!
I also find prayer to be hard at times because sometimes I just don’t know what to pray. Perhaps the same is true for you. When I find myself at a loss for words, I sometimes turn to one of the many prayers of the Bible. I often turn to the Lord’s Prayer and use one of the petitions from it when confronted by a situation that perplexes me. And there are also times when I have simply told the Lord, “I don’t know how to pray about this. I put it in Your hands.”
If you would like me to pray for you, please email me your prayer requests.
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,
Pastor Brian