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Dry prayers
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I came to the Lord today with dry prayers. I almost didn’t come.
I came with faith weak as a smoldering ember, unworthy of a Christian. I don’t know what the cause is: some unconfessed sin in my life? A general lack of a cultivated spiritual fervor that has caught up with me? Indigestion?
I almost skipped the whole thing till I could meet with better feelings, but recognized that as straight from the Enemy’s playbook.
I thought of David Peterson and Bubba Fahrbach in prison and the way they pray. That helped a lot. I considered (still without much of what psychologists call “affect”) that the Lord does not call us to gin up emotion; he just calls us to faithfulness.
I took encouragement from the fact that I can come to the throne in the name of Jesus, God’s beloved Son whom He will never turn away, no matter how ugly the Name-bearer is.
I parsed the spheres of responsibility correctly: there are the covenant stipulations I am responsible for (i.e., to pray), and then there are the things God is covenanted to do (i.e., to give the Holy Spirit’s joy).
God is honored by prayers offered in exhilaration. I am hoping that He is also honored by prayers brought in desert dryness — where the alternative was no prayer at all.
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End of an illusion
Did God really say…
A prayer from his word,
“As a hart panteth after the water brooks, so my soul panteth after Thee, O God.
My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God;…my tears have been my food day and night, While they continually say unto me, Where is thy God?…Jehovah will command his lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me…Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?
Psalm 42
Thanks, Andrée.
How is it that we can go through deep waters in the middle of a barren desert?
I’m there, but I still don’t know.
At the moment, I’m not enough of a Panting Hart.
As for the saints in all the earth, they are the excellent in whom is all my delight. Their sorrows shall be multiplied who give gifts for another god. Jehovah is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup: Thou maintainest my lot. The lines are fallen to me in pleasant places; yes, I have a goodly heritage.
Ps. 16
I am looking forward to the end of the “bad prayer day” on WOW.
Andree,
I so understand where you are, as I am there too!
I suppose that you could easily enough pray for God to help lift you out of this depression you find yourself in.
You are right, Llama.
I believe it is in the dry desert, when we feel or hear nothing, that we discover what we truly believe about God. Does He hear my prayers and care about me when I see, hear, feel, nothing? When it doesn’t make any sense? When it continues to fall apart? Or only when I *know* He’s there? It is not that we follow a *rule* or *routine* to pray, it is that we pray … believing … when we cannot hear or see … for however long it lasts. It is faith … and hope … that in the dark abyss, the thick, lingering of night, the infinite, dry desert … that God IS. Because, He is.