I Dont Know How to Pray!
It happened when I stood with a young widow beside the open casket of her husband. The church was awash with tears. Hearts lay broken in pieces all about me.
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Death, in all its fierce ugliness, struts about the room. And I stood there, searching my mind for words to talk to our Father about the pain and loss. Yet those words, so needed, seem to have fallen through an unseen hole in the bottom of my mouth. It happened last week at work.
The wife of one of my customers is strung out on meth, has shacked up with another user, and abandoned her husband and three-year-old daughter. He's trapped in a vortex of love and disgust, hatred and agony.
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It feels like his heart will explode every time his daughter asks, "Daddy, when's Mommy coming home? Where have all the words gone? The apostle says that to the church in Rome: Standing beside coffins, in unemployment lines, in jail cells, in lonely bedrooms, with crying children, with aging parents—we do not know what to pray for. How strange and yet how comforting: God prays to God for us, the Spirit to the Father. He sees through the fog of our emotions to what we truly need.
When You Don't Know How to Pray
God in Christ is as close as our skin. He stands with us at those funerals, in those jail cells, with those we love, as the constant presence of compassion. As the Spirit intercedes for us, Christ too prays on our behalf. The fourth man immediately stood and said, "Gentlemen, the Lord's Prayer. The interrogator was shouting, 'Stop, stop,' but we drowned him out.
But just before he got to the center of the area, the cell became pin-drop quiet. In Vietnamese, the interrogator spat out something to the guards, they grabbled number five SRO and they all left, locking the cell door behind them.
A Prayer for When You Don’t Know What to Pray - Your Daily Prayer - May 8, 2018
In his memoirs, Thorsness said, "Five courageous officers were tortured, but I think they believed it was worth it. From that Sunday on until we came home, we held a church service. Forty-two men in prison pajamas followed Ned's lead. I know I will never see a better example of pure raw leadership or ever pray with a better sense of the meaning of the words.
How To Pray When You Don't Know How To Pray
The Lord's Prayer and what it represented to these men was so precious they were willing to be tortured for their right to offer it to God; and it was so powerful no enemy could withstand the force of those simple words: Let's hold onto the Lord's Prayer like a drowning man. Let's teach it to our children, commit it to our memories, and pray it in public and private, in church, home, school, and community. Don't be afraid to say it, for it's our right and our responsibility.
And in your own moments of confusion or crisis, try out these words, offering them sincerely as Jesus taught us.
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It's what we can pray when we don't know what to pray. Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.
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Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Tap here to turn on desktop notifications to get the news sent straight to you. What do you pray when you don't know what to pray?