I find that the more time I spend in prayer the more time that I want to spend in prayer. 1 Thessalonians 5:17 is more of a desire or a wish to be a reality rather than the chore that it may have been at one time. Now, that does not mean that I did not desire to pray, it was just that the message of Paul to the Thessalonians of, “Pray without ceasing,” seemed as though it would be a chore. The more time I have spent developing my relationship with God over the years the more my day revolves around my communicating with Him. I find myself looking for ways throughout the day to spend time reflecting on and thanking the Lord for all He has done for me, and for His loving of me. I also try to see in each situation into which I am placed just exactly how I can bring Him glory. To be sure I do not always succeed in my desires, and that becomes another avenue of my prayers. Asking for His forgiveness as I fail at times to succeed in His will. As I had been preparing to write this blog today, I knew that it would be focused on prayer and I wondered how I could spend only 600 words or so on prayer. So much of my life, and I hope your life, is wrapped up into prayer and communication with God.
As I pondered Paul’s statement in Thessalonians, I also recalled Psalm 5. Often, our prayer intensity in terms of time spent grows as we face trouble and persecution. That is the premise of Psalm 5 as David does cry out for help to the Lord for help in the face of his enemies who are coming against him. In the opening two verses David, while in the throes of needing help, recognizes to whom he is praying and the power that God gives him to communicate. David’s words in that verse are, “Consider my groaning.” Does this draw our attention to the power of the Holy Spirit who resides in us as believers in Christ? Paul spoke directly to this as he wrote, “In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Romans 8:26). As we first see David groaning to the Lord in his prayer, we soon found as he turns more to the Lord, that his clarity in prayer grows. Verse three of the Psalm finds David saying, “In the morning I will order my prayer to You and eagerly watch” (Psalm 5:3). As we pray more, even despite what we perceive our inability to do so, the Holy Spirit moves in us, and not only allows the cries of our heart to heard by God, but He also orders our prayers to give us clarity.
Is not the basic premise of prayer to change us to see, and know God’s Will? We do not pray to change God. How could we want to change Him? He is perfect. Maybe as you read this you are considering your prayer life. We have been doing that this month of January during our morning devotions. Considering our prayer lives. No, our prayer lives will never be perfect, but we also need to be confident that despite our imperfections in understanding prayer, God hears us, God knows us, and God acts to see His will to be done in our lives. It can be hard to move past our ideas of prayer. Those ideas can be related to when we pray, where we pray, and even the words we think we need to use in our prayers. Maybe sometimes, just as David came to understand, we can conclude, “But let all who take refuge in You be glad. Let them ever sing for joy; and may you shelter them, that those who love Your name may exult in You” (Psalm 5:11).