prayer

Well, it was another really good photo day. I don't know why some days I see great shots everywhere I look, and other days I have trouble finding just one. Is it really that there are more photogenic landscapes and people on those days, or is it the condition of my heart, my mind, my soul? 

I thought I ought to tell you, God has been dealing with me about the issue of prayer. I think I posted concerning my doubts about prayer a few days ago. ("Overwhelmed" Friday, March 23)

So, you know I've been reading so much stuff for this on-line class I'm taking, including large chunks of Isaiah. I have had a pretty bad attitude about it, too, simply because I don't feel like anything is sinking in, because I'm rushing through it in such volume.

But yesterday, during a marathon stretch of reading in which I kept nodding off, a passage of scripture made me stop and take notice for a moment, and I knew God was talking to me.

It was a few verses in Isaiah 41 where God promised help and deliverance to Israel, and that their enemies would be crushed and dishonored and Israel would be victorious.

I wondered cynically to myself how many Jews in the 3000-plus years since that was written had claimed those promises and prayed in faith during desperate times, believing that God would make good, only to be horribly disappointed. It reminded me of my experience almost two years ago.

And then God asked, "Do you think I didn't want to do all that for my Chosen people?" Well, no. I think those verses express Your heart's desire for Israel. "Then do you think I wasn't able to help them?" Of course not. You can, obviously. "So why haven't those promises been fulfilled?" Well, it's prophecy. It isn't time yet.

Oh. Wait a minute… that was all for my benefit just now, wasn't it?

And then I remembered other verses in Isaiah that I had read last week: Isaiah 55:8-9. "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways," declared the Lord. "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts."

So, what You're saying is, I could be asking for something that is totally in line with Your will, the exact desire of Your heart, with the purest of motives, with unwavering faith, supported by scripture, and still not get what I ask for. Because You have a different plan that I can't see or understand right now. But it's absolutely better than the plan I have in mind. 

I mulled the whole thing over a little more today, as I pulled away for my half day with God. (Yes, same coffee shop; same decaf café mocha. They didn't even have to ask what I wanted today. They just punched it into the register.)

And I began to wonder, You're telling me that even if I pray for the exactly right thing in the exactly right way, it still doesn't guarantee that I will get what I want? So, what's the point of praying? And then I kind of sheepishly realized. Is that what I think prayer is? Making God give me what I ask for? "In fact," He kind of scolded (although gently), "the point of prayer is to remind you that you are NOT in control. The point is to get you to release the matter to Me. To let it go. To trust My plans more than your own." 

Yes. Of course. It seems so obvious when You put it that way.