The Power of Prayer

Books about prayer have been leaping off of bookshelves and into my hands for a while. Some are hokey, some are amazing, some are dull, some are exciting!
I know something about prayer. I grew up hearing about it, reading about it in the bible. Praying at meal times, bed times, troubeling times, praying for safety and for needs.
Suddenly, it seems, my heart is yearning for prayer. If I didn't pray early in the morning, I find myself sneaking off away from my LOUD family to spend a few moments in prayer. I keep a prayer journal and refer to it often. I want to speak to God and I want God to speak to me.
If you read my posts regularly, you'll notice that I often wonder why my life is the way it is. Most especially, when so many children? One of the reasons is becoming clear (one of many reasons).
Prayer. If it is difficult at best for me to get all six children out of the house to someplace where I have to have an eyeball and hand available for each one, by myself, chances are, we won't go. I end up saying
'no' to many activities because of my husband's schedule. I can not, in good consience, take my children on my own to whatever it is and expect everything to go well. So...we spend a little more time at home. I find a little more time to pray. My prayer time is becoming more purposeful. There is power it prayer. It's amazing to note things that happen when I know that people have been praying about a specific thing.
I know that God would have to 'ground' me in a significant way in order to make me consider prayer a significant and useful part of my life, then do it.


*UPDATE TO POST*

I wrote this post eight years ago, just at the beginning of my blogging journey.  I wish I could say I'm better at editing now, but I'm not.

I can say I'm better at prayer.

Maybe not 'at prayer', but at praying. The actual doing of it. If I say I'm going to pray for you, I mean it. I don't forget to as often these days. If you post about needing prayer on social media, I pray in the moment when I see it. If I have time to be scrolling through, I have time to stop and pray.

Praying at all times isn't mysterious anymore. It is possible, and preferable. That part I keep trying to get better at. Praying without ceasing. I wish I could say that my thoughts are always on the Kingdom of Heaven. They aren't. My thoughts roam. Sometimes they get caught on something. Now and then they build things. Big things that are impossible to see around. I have quite a talent for assuming what's going to happen, and then taking it around with me as truth.

Often, though, I get to recognize it. I get to take down whatever thing my roaming thoughts constructed, and see it for what it is, or at least to take off my own perception of it and stare at it for a minute.

This often results in just walking away from a thought. My own thought. The thought that I grabbed and built into some ruinous monster. I can do that through prayer. It's really the only way I can do it.

I've tried before. Just squeeze my eyes really tight, think of something else and then when I open my eyes, the thought that was bothering me will magically disappear.

Sometimes that can work, at least temporarily. Then it really is just a magicians trick. Not really magic.

The real magic is when I give a thing to God, leave it in His hands, and trust that he will take care of it. That doesn't mean I have no responsibility left. I still have to leave it in his hands. I still have to chat with Him, learn about His character, build mine.

Talking to God is a significant and useful thing in my life. I do it. It helps.

I'd still like to get to the 'pray without ceasing' part. I don't know that I'll recognize when it happens, but I've observed people who, at the very least, appear to live this way. It's encouraging, the wisdom, strength and kindness of such people.

I don't know if anyone will ever describe my life that way, but I do aspire to reflect God's character. The best way I know how to learn it is by talking with Him.