Its very interesting, borderline funny how we approach prayer. We come together many times at church, as if that is were God resides, that church is were God hears best, and we get together in a circle not sure why a circle but I guess a triangle just wouldn’t cut it. As we gather together we say to each what were believe for, Jacobs mother is in the hospital, Ann has a job interview tomorrow, Laura is trying to balance work and family and we sit here and share these things together, we chat about them and then we say lets pray. We all do this, I’m guilty as well we sit around and talk about our prayer request and then we begin to pray as if God didn’t hear us. I sometimes wonder if God in His divine humor is thinking, “do you think I didn’t hear that?” It seems this is how many of us pray publicly. In our private time we initiate the “me prayer”. The prayer that involves getting all of our wants and needs out there first before we get to the prayers of those who we love, of those who we hate, of social justice, of be salt and light, of bring the good news to the four corners of the earth. Its as if we feel that God has a priority list with our prayers, and that there answered on a first come first prayed basis, that the order that we pray is the order that God will answer them. When I see this it strikes me right in the gut. I’m showing my priorities by the way I pray. I’m speaking out my desires and wants in my prayers, but what I see the underline of it or perhaps a better term the sub-conscious of my prayer its all about me, bless me, help me, love me and many more me’s, the list goes on and on. This connects us all, no one can deny that we all love to talk about ourselves. We never really get bored of me. When I think what God is really after is for us to flip the m upside right and begin focusing on we.

All through life we run into people, and they share their problems with us, they share their needs and their prayers and in typical fashion we say, “I’ll be praying for you” which is beautiful, but do we always do it? Or perhaps have we allowed this to just be an expression? I bring it into question, because I’m just as guilty. I’ve been there in the church hall, talking to the mother, the youth, the deacon and saying yes I will pray for you but then walking away. When I look at it though what I see is someone asking for prayer, not tomorrow, not next week, not Thursday, I see them asking for prayer now. We miss this, maybe its because we only feel comfortable doing it in certain situations, or maybe we have allowed it to be just an expression, but not a real truth lived out. This is not a message of condemnation; it’s a message for us as believers, as disciples of Jesus, to rethink our posture on prayer. To realize that our lives are constantly battling good and bad, our motives are all over the place. At times we can be the most loving people and other times the most selfish people. If we allow ourselves to think our relationship with God is contingent on getting right first we have it all backwards. To think I have to get it straight before I can be on holy ground is missing it, when we open our eyes and allow our hearts to be broken for righteousness we realize that we are always on holy ground for we live in a world with an immanent God, a everywhere present creator. If we only see our unworthiness, we will in a sense become paralyzed. Lets rethink the way we do and live out prayer because if we as Christians will no longer be satisfied with being the crust of society, we will become the yeast of which a new culture will rise up.