Here are some ramblings from my journey… Still exploring, still learning, still seeking deeper understanding, still growing…
Within the context of a loving relationship, conversation is the thing that keeps us connected, interacting, engaged, growing…
If prayer is conversation with God, does the way we pray contain all those elements that say we are truly connected and engaged; open and honest; responsible and committed; intentional and sincere? A well rounded sum of all that goes into a heart-to-heart, deep, meaningful conversation?
Part 2 – Asking for the Right Things
I woke up late one night with intense anxiety about something valuable I thought I had accidentally tossed in the trash. An item that was precious to me. An item of both sentimental and monetary value. I beat myself up over the possibility of how stupid I might have been. If it was indeed in the trash, it was now long gone and there was no hope of ever recovering it. And I had no way of verifying anything till morning.
Unable to go back to sleep, I groaned deeply. How could I have been so careless? Or had I put it in a safe place? And if so, which safe place?
I prayed. “God, please let it be in a safe place, not in the trash!”–the kind of irrational prayer we pray in desperate situations. The kind of prayer that expects God to magically reverse something stupid I do, something I’m responsible for.
While God is known for working miracles, he rarely interferes with the laws of physics or alters the consequences of our choices. We make decisions. We make choices. And we act on them. Naturally, all our actions/behavior have consequences – good or bad. And in most cases, it is impossible to “take back” our actions or to reverse their consequences. We must live with them.
In my situation, if I had accidentally thrown away my treasure, a natural flow of events that would have transpired: from the trash can in our bedroom into our trash bin in the alley which would have been picked up by our stellar (and punctual) trash crew and dumped into their garbage truck. Eventually all the contents of the garbage truck would be crushed and compacted before ending up in a landfill somewhere amidst millions of tons of trash.
Did I expect God to magically reverse all this and change the outcomes? To miraculously rescue my treasure from a landfill and put it back where it had last sat in my home? To forcibly alter my action of throwing it in the trash?
Not a very logical prayer. And yet, this is how we pray. Most of the time. God, please help me do well in this exam even though I’ve only studied some of the material for it. God, please save my marriage even if I’m not working hard at it. God, please don’t let me get a traffic ticket today, even though I’m speeding.
How easy it is to limit prayer to asking God to change difficult situations we find ourselves in, begging Him to wave a magic wand that will make the consequences for our actions go away…
Asking is not a bad thing. The problem is that we often ask for the wrong things and try to avoid taking responsibility for what is truly ours – our choices, our decisions, our actions, our behavior.
I realized that night that I should have been asking for everything I needed to be able to handle a difficult situation the next day, including the humility to take responsibility for my mistake and wisdom for dealing with the consequences of my mistake.
So while God seldom reverses the results of our actions (intentional or unintentional) or makes them disappear, He does give us all that we need to deal with what comes next. He journeys with us as we learn and grow. He teaches us responsibility and encourages us towards maturity.
You may also want to check out these posts:
http://www.ducodivina.com/on-how-then-should-we-pray/
http://www.ducodivina.com/on-hitting-the-mark/
http://www.ducodivina.com/on-praying responsibly/
http://www.ducodivina.com/on-the-reality-of-living-in-a-corrupted-world/
~shini abraham, ©2016, duco divina – contemplative doodling
Recent Comments