Prayerfully

Here’s a reason I don’t post more often: getting started is the hardest part.  I will sit and stare at the blank screen for a good five minutes with no idea how to jump in to (into??) what I want to say.  So I finally just give up and close the window.  And that’s how I feel right now.  (See: math teacher – not English).  But…I’m willing myself to power through.  Which is why I’ve just written an intro about how I can’t write intros.

Have I lost you yet? (crickets chirping)

Prayer that been on my mind a lot lately.  It’s something that seems so basic and so fundamental, yet I have a really hard time wrapping my head around it.  (Which is maybe the problem right there).  If you asked me why people should pray I really don’t know what I would tell you beyond “because God wants us to, He instructs us to…because Jesus did.”

Every time I post an update on B and ask for prayer I feel a little…silly?  I’m not sure, really.  I mean, you’re not – we’re not – going to change God’s mind about what will ultimately happen with Brock.  So why even ask other people to pray?

And then I think about scripture like this that instructs us to be persistent in presenting our request to God.  Or this passage.  Have you read it?  I mean the whole thing?  I know the Lord’s prayer and I know the whole ‘ask, seek, knock’ thing but I had no clue they were mere verses apart from each other.  (Sad, isn’t it?)  And the parable in between?  I’m pretty sure I’ve never read it.  The man doesn’t give to his friend because it’s a friend that’s asking – but because of his boldness.  Because the friend trudged through the black of night and was bold enough to knock on the door and ask for some bread.  And was the bread for himself?  No.  But for “a friend of mine on a journey who has come to me.” 

Is that not what I am every time I ask you to pray for B?  A friend of yours on a journey who has come to you.  God grants our requests – gives us “as much as” we need – because we are bold enough to approach the throne of grace.  Not just on our own behalf but on the behalf of others. 

See – I can’t even wrap my head around it.

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Reading: Prayer by Philip Yancey and On Earth As It Is In Heaven by Warren Wiersbe