Prayer 101

When I was young, my prayers were simple; “God please help me”. That was enough. I felt that He was listening and that He knew what I needed and that He would give me what I needed and He did. When I became older however my life became more complicated. There were adult problems and as an adult I knew the solutions, but I still needed help from God to make my solutions work.

So my prayers became more specific. I actually prayed more often but for some reason I felt that he no longer answered me. I thought maybe I am not good enough, maybe God is angry with me and that is why He isn’t answering. I talked with others about my feelings and there was one answer that most of my friends gave me; God doesn’t always answer our prayers. Hmmm I though. What kind of God is He that He doesn’t answer my prayers?

So I went for many years feeling disconnected from God. Oh I tried to reconnect from time to time but I kind of felt like hey if He doesn’t take the time to talk to me, why should I talk to Him? Wow was I ever wrong and so were all those people that told me that God doesn’t always answer our prayers. He does. My God answers all my prayers. The problem for me was that His answers weren’t always what I wanted to hear so I just ignored them. The problem was that I asked God to help me with my plan instead of asking God what his plan for me was. So simple that it evaded me.

And I started thinking about all those times when I prayed for help with major problems in my life and about the outcomes in those situations. And in each and every case, something happened that lead me from the troubled spot that I was in at the time. And even thought it wasn’t the escape route that I had hoped for it was in fact an escape route and it brought me to a better place. So I truly believe that my prayers have always been answered but I was just too busy looking for MY answer to see God’s answer.

So I decided to get back to basics. I no longer pray for God to help me with my plan, I now pray for God’s will to be done. In this day and time of evil all around us I simply pray that God be in control in my life. And He is. I pray that God be in control in your life too.

Blessings,

Greg