Prayer: The Gate

As you can see, I’m still working through the Mark 11:24 thing.  “Believe you have received it and it shall be yours.”

 We can easily let our obsessions, worries and wants to take over our prayer life.  It is easy to fall in the rut of asking the same thing every day.  I have heard it said that once you plant the row of seeds, you don’t want to keep digging the row up every day, or the crop won’t grow.  And so it is with our prayers (sow it is with our prayers?…)

How do we turn it over to God? How do we “believe we have received it”?

I am finding this requires a conversational style of prayer.  Not a “drive by”, as I do on many busy mornings. “Hey God, thanks for the day…got to run…bye”.

Conversational prayer takes some time, and as with any conversation it goes both ways.  So get quiet, invite God to be with you in this moment, feel the presence of God, listen for his voice.  Then at this point I am letting my request be made known to God, and letting him know that I place it lovingly in his hands.

Now is the time to begin thinking of it as done.  I think this is the place in time that I have to transition my thinking and feelings where I believe my prayer has been answered.  And this is where we need to find that unwaivering faith.  If we can get that faith right down into our very souls, we can “believe we have received it”, even if we can’t see it right this second, we walk by faith and not by sight.

Blessings to you all this weekend, and may you have the faith that moves mountains.

Newsong

For a long time I kept three prayers lists.  The three lists were

1. Things I wanted
2. Things I wanted to get rid of
3. Things or mostly people I was thankful for. 

Whenever I was depressed or down, I would look at list number 3 and it I know it sounds kind of simple or childish, but I would feel better.

List number 1 is always a fun list to put together.  It kind of runs a wide range of ideas for me.  I want to be a good wife.  I want to listen more than I talk.  I want a sprinkler system for the yard and central air conditioning. I want to know I am a divine idea in the mind of God and I want to live my life in the divine plan or purpose without regret.  To do that I will want to be brave and willing to let God utilize my gifts and talents.  Let his will be done in my life.

Things I want to get rid of.  Now you may think that is a crazy kind of list, but what I put on this list is bad habits.  My addicition to smoking was on this list for a long time.  The prayer was answered.  The nature of God is so good.  I tend to save everything, so I want to get rid of the things that are no longer necessary in my life, things that I don’t find beautiful or useful anymore.

Things I am thankful for.  This list has items like my good health, the ability to have a great job that I enjoy.  My unique creative ideas and the ability to express them in deeply satisfying ways.  Family and friends are always on the list.

It is always amazing when I find a list written a year or more ago, how many prayers have been answered.  I’m sure your prayers are answered as well.   Take a little time to think about the answered prayers.  It gives us all hope to carry on and know that God is listening and he is answering our prayers.

Newsong