A friend asked me personally to pray for him.  He was facing a difficult time and so I did.  He is a Christian and knows what he asked for so I granted his request.  He asked me to pray for an ailing family member and for his family in relation to that.

The person that I prayed for died.  I’m ok with that.  I didn’t know her and I didn’t pray for God to save her life.  I prayed that God’s Will be done.  That is what he asked for and is what he meant.  When he told me that this person had passed the conversation was short.  He told me and I replied, “Gods Will.  What can I do to help”.  That was, I hope, a comfort to him.  It is brief but we are both strong enough to know the whole conversation that lives behind it.  I know that he knows what it meant and he knows that I know.  There was no reason for a long conversation.  Me explaining it to him would have  been an insult.  It was unnecessary.

Prayer, for me, is a private matter.  Very private.   In almost all prayerinstances I will refuse to pray publicly and am offended when asked to do so.  That’s a bit of a departure from my Southern Baptist upbringing but not by much.  In our church growing up the right to pray before the church was reserved for the pastor.  On very rare occasions he would ask another to say a prayer during service.  These were always older men who had been in the congregation for many many years.  I held them in awe (and still do) because they were Godly men.  Not “good” people.  Not merely Christian but Godly men.  I am not those men.  Not even close.

There are a few people… very few… that I will allow to say a blessing over food at my house.  A prayer is a conversation between the person praying and God.  That sounds small so I will say it again.  It is a conversation with GOD.  With THE GOD.  God who holds the power of life and death, the power of eternity, the power of salvation and praying2damnation.  That God.  A prayer isn’t a neat little ditty to be belted out by children without meaning.  It isn’t a chance to present yourself as a faithful before a meal.  It is a conversation with God.  That said, there is nothing more pure.  Nothing more right than listening to a child pray.  Rob’s kids are often allowed to say a blessing before a meal at my home.  It’s the way he has raised them and what he believes.  They do it reverently and with feeling.  There is nothing more pure than that.  Nothing.

I realize that those two ideas don’t necessarily connect.  Robs faith and mine are different.  He teaches his children his beliefs and he does it correctly.  It is a joy to listen to them pray.

But to me, prayer is more than that.  When you have truly prayed you kneel before god because your knees are too weak to bear your weight. You clasp your hands before you to stop them from trembling with fear and you bow your head in shame and reverence.  You close your eyes to hold back the tears.  You speak your heart to the God who who already knows it. Then you have prayed.  Then you have spoken to God. 

I often hear people say, “we’re praying for you” and I wonder… are you?  I hear people say, “thank God!” and wonder… do you?

There are those who I know pray every day.  They even, I know, do it properly.  I can’t.  I should but there’s a lot of fear and pain and love built into it that I can’t deal with on a daily basis.  It’s an emotional rinse cycle that I can’t bear.  Maybe that’s wrong.  I know that I should pray more often than I do but one can only hope that doing it right counts for some little something.

When I feel the need to ask someone to pray for me there are only a very few people that I would ask to do it.  Only four or five that I know WILL actually do it and only two or three that I know will do it properly.   It’s good to know those three or four. 

Really good.

Pray for me…

7 thoughts on “Pray for me…

  • September 17, 2009 at 4:29 am
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    I got tired of arguing with teachers and administrators at my kid’s (public) school and put him in a Christian school here in town. The only time I got heated with the folks running the Christian school was when they tried to tell my kid how he wasn’t praying properly.

    What’s right for you may not be right for me. I respect your God-fearing approach, but I’d also expect you to respect the fact that I know God loves me and I approach him like a doting Father. In your home you have a right to set the rules. Anyone who doesn’t respect that isn’t worth your attention.
    But I agree that praying is, and should be, one of the most intimate things you do. If it’s not, it’s not being done properly.

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  • September 17, 2009 at 12:18 pm
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    Thanks Greybeard. I’m one of the first to admit that in this I’m in deep. I blame upbringing. Too much time (if there is such a thing) listening to fire and brimstone sermons as a child.

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  • September 17, 2009 at 12:40 pm
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    Excellent article, prayer is critical. I wrote a post a while back on Why and How we pray, I believe it is very important that Christians get this right.

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  • September 17, 2009 at 3:41 pm
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    Just so you know I do try to pray every day and I know I didn’t do this as much as I should have in the past. If someone asks me to pray for them, then I drop what I am doing and find a quiet place and pray for them right there and then. I try to pray for all my friends daily, but sometimes I lift ones that are struggling up in prayer by actual name.

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  • September 18, 2009 at 12:05 am
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    I love you Tommy. Thank you for sharing your heart with us today.

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  • October 29, 2009 at 3:27 pm
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    Romans 8:26-27 is a Scripture I like when it comes to prayer and me not knowing what to pray or how to pray. Simply, I am assured by that Scripture that the Holy Spirit knows my heart and the intent of my prayer. The Holy Spirit goes to the Father and explains my prayer. I don’t have to know any more than that when I pray.

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