Prayer

Prayer.

We talk about it.  We say we’ll do it as in “I’ll pray for you” or “Please pray for my (mom/daughter/sister/husband)” or “You are in my thoughts and prayers”.

This week has been interesting.  My mom had to go in for some tests and I prayed really hard for her.  I asked others to pray for her.  I prayed for nothing to be wrong and for her to be healthy and for her to live forever.  I know that last one is unrealistic but I might as well say it, God knows what’s in my heart.

Sometimes we pray for the impossible because we believe in miracles.  I believe in miracles.  I believe in prayer.

My mom had given me a book that I love and I turned to the page for the day of her tests and here’s what I found:

“Therefore we do not lose heart.  Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen.  For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”    -2 Corinthians 16-18

It was perfectly what I needed to read.  It changed the way I was looking at the situation.   God’s words changed me.

Today in church we learned of another young man in our community who has passed away.  He was the father of young children and it is a terrible tragedy.  We have been praying for him in his sickness and will continue to do so now.  We will pray for his family.

We pray because we believe that something eternal is going on.  We believe that something bigger than what we can see is happening.  We believe that we are not alone.

We pray for health, for freedom from addiction, for good results, for less sadness, for less loneliness, for forgiveness.  We pray for understanding and peace and comfort.

When we were younger, we may have prayed for the winning hit or the strike out or the good score on the ACT or the acceptance letter.  As we get older, we learn to pray for “acceptance of whatever comes our way” even if we lose the game or we fail the test.  We learn to aim higher – we learn to pray for more eternal things like grace and gratitude and wisdom.

We pray in gratitude and we pray in grief.  We “offer it up” because we can’t bear it alone.

We pray alone in bed at night and we pray in community.  We pray in cars on highways and country roads and alongside accident sites.  We pray before meals.

We pray for our leaders and our families and our friends.  We pray for our children and our marriages and our relationships.  We pray for ourselves.

We pray for transformation.

We pray when we don’t know what else to do.  We pray because we know He hears.

And if for a minute we doubt that He is hearing us at all, we pray for Him to remove that doubt, we pray for a sign, we pray for open eyes and ears and hearts so we can see and feel Him.  We pray.  And we are changed.

©2012 Sue Bidstrup, Great Big Yes™ All Rights Reserved