Good Thursday morning! The umm what day is it pause is because I stayed up late reading last night. Sometimes a person just runs into a great book. One blessing from giving up my XM subscription is a little place on the FM dial at 88.7 called My Bridge Radio. I'm sure many of you have already become familiar with this, but just in case, I will pass it along. This is for Sidney by the way, there are other stations in Nebraska that you can find at mybridgeradio.net. I liked the station so much that I became a day sponsor this year. Whoo hoo!
Lately, I have been on the receiving end of messages about prayer. One series even had something about getting on your knees in the title. Of course the devil is going to bog a person down in the details when we hear messages like this. "Your old knees can't take much of that..." may be something you hear whispered in your mind. We can too easily get stopped by details. Kneeling is a way to show our respect and reverence for God. However, that isn't the only way to show reverence. You may not be able to kneel, but in concentrating on that we miss the point of becoming a prayer warrior. The devil likes to point out the "can't" part of our walk with Christ.
The minister dwelt often on the "get on your knees" part, and I am guilty of seeing the "can't" part of that too. We can take the message in a metaphorical sense though and adjust our prayer accordingly. Perhaps you can sit on the floor, or simply bow your head, or maybe you cannot physically perform any kind of submissive gesture! That isn't the point. If kneeling were necessary, don't you think Jesus would have mentioned it in Matthew 6 when He teaches us how to pray? Jesus instead teaches about avoiding vain repetitions, going into your closet, praying in secret, and then gives us the model prayer we know as the Lord's Prayer.
You and I know about religions that emphasize various paraphernalia for proper prayer. None of this is necessary in our prayer. What we do need is to think of it more in terms of a conversation with God. Even without the methods and nick-nacks, we tend to make prayer a one-way mental blast of needs and wants going up to Heaven. God has trouble getting a word in edgewise! In a conversation we talk and listen. Sometimes you may feel the need to pray flat out on your face, other times on your knees and often while walking or driving, but no position should inhibit your talking and listening with God. Want to show your reverence for God? Work hard on the listening part. I'm as guilty as any of sending up that blast of talk to God and failing to slow down to listen for His answers. One thing I hear more often than any other in my prayer is a gentle "shhhh!" telling me to ease up on the mental whirlwind of thoughts and emotions. It's tough to slow down and listen in this rush-rush life and culture we have going right now, but we may need to learn how to do that more and more.
Have a wonderful Thursday in Christ!
Bucky
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