Prayer

We often reject the thing that we need most. We often believe the lie that by denying something altogether, then there’s nothing to lose. We do this because we are afraid to want the very thing that could make us or break us. 

Afraid of intimacy, 

because it risks rejection. 

Afraid of trying,

because it risks failure. 

Afraid of vulnerability,

because it risks exposure. 

Afraid of having faith,

because it risks being wrong. 

I’m a control freak. I hate surprises. I like to plan five steps ahead and have all the answers. I want to be self sufficient, not relying on anyone or anything else… which is why I didn’t pray. Not because I didn’t believe in prayer. I was afraid of prayer. 

Afraid that if I became real with God, 

He wouldn’t accept me.

Afraid of asking for His will, 

and losing everything I’d strived for. 

Afraid that by asking for help,

I was accepting defeat. 

Afraid that in asking God for answers,

I’d discover answers I didn’t like.

Afraid of believing for something, 

only to be later let down. 

Prayer is such an intangible thing, it is submitting all power and control into something you can’t touch or see… and that can be incredibly difficult. But why is it that the more I embrace prayer and relinquish my own control, the more free I feel? I’m discovering that prayer does so much within us when we step outside of ourselves. By praying for others, I feel more connected to them. By talking to God, His voice becomes more familiar. By asking for His will, the things He desires starts to become the things I desire. By submitting to the power of God, His true love and identity begins to come to life in tangible ways. 

It still isn’t easy… to invest so much in the unseen. But I am slowly becoming more okay with not having all the answers and surrendering to God who truly does.