21 February 2013 - praying like our lives depend on it

21 February 2013 - praying like our lives depend on it

God of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, blessed are you. 
Help me, who am alone and have no help but you,
for I am taking my life in my hand.

Yesterday and today the LORD is trying to teach us how to pray.  He wants a sincerity that comes from a knowledge of who he is.

As a child I used to hear from the books of my forefathers
that you, O LORD, always free those who are pleasing to you.

Knowing that he is loving and faithful helps us to trust the LORD even when it means taking our lives in our hands as Queen Esther did.

Therefore, Jesus tells us:

“Ask and it will be given to you;
seek and you will find;
knock and the door will be opened to you.

It is a beautiful passage, but it is challenging.  We ask all the time and we don't seem to receive.  But as James tells us,  "the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed about by the wind.  For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord,
since he is a man of two minds, unstable in all his ways."  

It begins with the LORD's revelation of who he is for us.  That leads to the trust to ask him in faith for the our desires.  Then we will have confidence that the our God truly has a father's heart for us.

Which one of you would hand his son a stone
when he asked for a loaf of bread,
or a snake when he asked for a fish?

But we must not be like the prodigal son who asks for his inheritance to squander.  James also warns, "You ask but do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions."  

Yesterday Jesus gave us words we can pray with confidence, knowing they do not come from our passions.  He wants us to pray that the Father's identity is revealed more and more to us and that who he is comes to shape our world more and more as his kingdom comes.  We ask him for what we need, both material and spiritual.  We will then come to experience his fatherly care more and more in our lives until eventually we can say:

I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all my heart,
for you have heard the words of my mouth;
in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise