Prayer

Part of the reason that I began this blog is for my personal edification. Yes, it is about me. I have learned that I organize my thoughts better when I put them down in writing. As it is, today's post will be an attempt of an honest, introspective, contemplative look at one of my personal weaknesses. I don't pray enough. Sure, we all could probably say that, but when I carefully examine the use of my time I realize that it consumes very little of my life. God has been convicting me about this recently and so I deviated from normal devotional reading today and instead looked at a few select verses on prayer.

I started reading in James 5:13 where I find the simple command to pray. "Is any among you suffering? Let him pray." So there it is. My ineptness when it comes to prayer is simply disobedience. Who among us doesn't have suffering? Sure, it may not be physical, but we have a serious sin problem that is certainly causing some suffering. And in Romans 12:12 it says to be "constant in prayer." I'm not praying like I know I should and therefore I am being disobedient to His clear commands.

So if I am to say that I love and treasure God above all else, and that I desire to glorify Him in all that I do and yet I have this area of disobedience in my life because I don't follow a simple command to pray, then I think it is safe to say that He is not my true treasure. "Where your heart is there your treasure will be." Matthew 6:21 And again in verse 33 of chapter 6 where it commands me to seek His kingdom first. However, I want Him to be my true treasure. I want Him to be magnified and not me, so I must confront this disobedience in my life, put on the armor, and go to war against myself.

As I began this battle, I have purposed to examine prayer more closely. To do a study on true Biblical guidelines to prayer. To help with that today, I plan on meditating on these words from James 5:13 "Let him pray" and the words "be constant in prayer" from Romans 12:12. I also downloaded this sermon to listen to while I am in the shop today.

I would like to quote John Piper on prayer. "Prayer is the splicing of our limp wire to the lightning bolt of heaven." Unfortunately, I'm not sure that at this time my prayer life has a current and that is what concerns me.