Message for Sunday, August 23, 2020 – Proper 16

Views from the Pews on Prayer

With the pending general elections at hand,  the discussion as to whether schools should be opened together with the rise in the numbers of COVID 19 cases the world over, there is a need for persistent and continuous prayer.

There was a time when it seemed adequate to simply go through the routine of bedtime prayers, and thanking God for waking us each morning.  Prayer was not time spent enjoying God’s company, offering thanks and praise, but rather a quick well-rehearsed verse, something learned from childhood, something to always remember so that we could always say that we had prayed.

That is not enough!  Prayer is so greatly neglected, quite sadly, as the most powerful energy one can generate is “prayer energy.”  Many of us say we don’t know how to pray.  I once knew that feeling.  I no longer do.  I have spent many quiet hours just conversing with God, thanking Him for His many blessings, sharing my joys, my concerns, waiting for his guidance, and gradually it becomes easier and easier to speak to Him, as well as converse with others about God and his wondrous works.  I have acquired that energy, and it is a feeling we all should share!  How does one acquire this energy?  It really is quite easy.  We learn by doing.  Let us pray every time we get a chance.  Let us pray as we wake, in the car, in the street, in the shop, in traffic, at school, at work, every time the opportunity presents itself; and if we think about it, we get the opportunity very often.  We just don’t make use of it.

Practice constantly!  It can only improve our ability, and isn’t the best way to learn anything, by so doing?  If we want, therefore, to utilize the matchless power of prayer, let us begin praying immediately and continue to do so every opportunity we get.  We can transform spare moments by praying for our needs, fro those around us, for our friends and loved ones, for everyone and everything.  Then, it is important for us to believe that our prayers will be answered.                                  

‘Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours’… Mark 11:24