Prayer

With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings?...Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression?...He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. - Micah 6: 6-8

Prayer. I have been meeting with a group of guys going through a devotional book about how God calls us to live. Part of that life is prayer, so I have been thinking about that lately. Prayer is so much more than just the words. Where is the heart and where are the words coming from? How is life being led?

In prayer, I think God pays as much attention to the lives we are leading as he does to the words we are using. I like that last part, in Micah, walk humbly with him, pray without ending, and never lose heart.

I think that is why I sometimes get frustrated in prayer and begin questioning if God heard me. I think he is looking for a pure heart leading a God centered life. One of the verses I have committed to memory is John15:7 - If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. It's not just saying the words or the prayer...it starts with being centered in him. For me its been getting into the Bible and putting it into my heart through memory. Not always an easy thing to do...it has been a personal struggle lately. It is been easy to come up with plenty of excuses of "needing" to do something else, which sounds so stupid as I type this...what could be more important? Nada