OK, so today is REALLY the first day in my year of praying powerfully. January first, it hit me that I am called to pray. Why I am so shocked by that, I am not sure. :) I have found myself called to many things in life, but for some reason, I never say prayer as a part of it. Again, I ask myself, why not?!
So the only rule I thought I needed was simple. I thought, "All I really need to do is pray." So I started thinking about that. How simple that thought seemed. All you have to do is PRAY. OK. I do that. I do it fairly often. But I need more. 1st Thessalonians 5:17 says, "Pray without ceasing." That verse has always stuck in my head. You see, when I was 16, I went to a summer camp called Centrifuge. I loved Centrifuge--it was one of the coolest summer memories for me. We always had to play relays, and one of them (infallibly) was a scripture relay. I always picked that verse because it was short... and some one always chose John 11:35, "Jesus wept." Oh, the workings of a 16 year old brain... :)
I want to change that. I want that verse, "Pray without ceasing," to remind me not of summer camp from childhood days, but rather the year that changed my life. I need to be more consistent. I need to pray daily.
Then... I thought some more. And thought, I need to pray honestly. The other night in the car, we heard the song, "Jesus Bring the Rain." The lyrics say:
Bring me joy, bring me peace
Bring the chance to be free
Bring me anything that brings
You glory And I know there'll
be days When this life brings me pain
But if that's what it takes to
praise You Jesus, bring the rain
My Dad, Virgil, said that this is a hard song to sing and mean it. And I immediately looked up the lyrics up on my iPhone. Even though I know the lyrcis, there is something so powerful to me in seeing them in black and white. I couldn't even finish reading the lyrics because if I sing that prayer through song, then it must mean it. And prayer must be honest, above all else. When I pray, I must mean every word I say--and can I really ask God to 'bring the rain?' I want to be able to ask that, but for right now I cannot bring myself to do it... Like Abram, I need God to move me to that place by commanding me to take one step at a time.
Wow. That's a lot.
In my life, depending on the task set in front of me, I have done one of two things--I have worked so hard that failure was an impossibility (in my mind) or slacked off so that failure found me inevitably. There really isn't any in between. Except, it seems, my prayer life. I don't want that. I want to pray passionately and this is the year of passionate prayer.
So, please join me on this journey--this journey that will lead to places unknown to me, but guided by God's hand. Please, share thoughts, notes, and prayer needs... and pray without ceasing!
Jenny
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Jenny - I'm not kidding, I woke up singing that song this morning - so let that be an encouragement for you! :) For me it was a reminder that I need to pray, and I need to press in - and if I don't, God may take me back through a trial just to remind me of my need to do it. That may not be a right theology, but that was my thought. Here I am newly married, yet jobless, feeling as if I have no purpose, and its so easy to get caught in that trap of staying in my pjs all day and just vegging out. But that's not what God has called me to - he's called me to a time of SEEKING - a time of hearing his voice and knowing my next step - not hiding out from the world b/c the journey is over - HA - its just begun! Its time for me to hop back on the magic carpet and go where it takes me!
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