Lord Teach Us To Pray

Why do we fold our hands when we pray? 

There are a lot of theories out there and many of them make sense but the one I like is the one that explains that if you were an enemy  soldier captured by a Roman soldier you could avoid immediate death by folding your hands which indicated you have surrendered and were ready to be shackled and taken into captivity. This symbol of surrender is a proper one for us to adopt when we pray. 

THERE IS POWER IN PRAYER ! 

What a great power we have within us. Each of us can make the creator of the universe stop whatever he is doing and actually listen to us. Can you imagine that? The God that built the galaxies, who set the planets in their places, who keeps all things in existence is there ready to listen to you or I.  The power of God is so very great that when you are lifting yourself up in prayer to Him you have His whole attention! He cares about the most minute things in your life and He wants you to share them with Him.  It is true that he already knows all of your problems,sins, virtues and needs before you can mention them but He wants you to freely demonstrate your trust in Him by telling them in your own way and in your own words. 

Trust In God 

Our prayers show God that we trust Him and that we recognize Him as our true and most loving Father. Our prayers make us realize that we cannot do it alone, that we need help and that help is only one breath away. Sometimes our needs are so great that we cannot put them into words. In those times of great stress, God's spirit will pray of us in words and ways we do not understand. 

Prayer As An Obligation

Prayer is an obligation too. God can and will exist quite nicely even if we do not pray. When we pray we acknowledge our dependence. Prayer helps us to conform to the will go God and helps us find what His will is.  

There are many methods of prayer out there some of which are quite complex and take years to master. But simple prayer is nothing more than speaking to the Lord as to a friend. The strange thing about it is the more that we pray the more we recognize the beauty and wonderful nature of God. 

Pray With Confidence

We should pray with confidence and with trust and with persistence. God answers all prayers, and I mean all prayers.  There are only three answers God gives to prayer. The first is the one we long to hear, "Yes." There is nothing better than you and God agreeing fully about something. Yes is more beautiful than any other word you can hear when you pray. The second answer is "No."  We really dislike when the answer to our prayer is "No."  When the answer is no, we have to accept it as if it were a yes. This is because that yes and no are the same answer, the answer that expresses inexhaustible love for us. 

Like a good Father,He will give us everything that we need, but not necessarily everything that we want. Yes and no are easy to deal with compared to the third possible answer to prayer and that answer is "Wait." Why should we wait? We know what we need, we know what is good, why does He make us wait? We have to remember that this earth is not our home.  Our home is in heaven with God and He will give us everything that we need to make it to heaven. Sometimes that means we have to wait for a time. 

Praying in or out of the foxhole 

It is sad that more people do not realize that within them they have this great power, a direct line to God. Some people resort to prayer when all other possibilities under their control have been used and they are in a foxhole with enemy shells whizzing overhead. It is okay to pray then of course, but personally I when the enemy seemingly is winning I would rather have a personal ongoing relationship with God, not because he is more or less likely to answer my prayer, but rather my spirit would be calmer knowing by experience that he will answer and his answer will come in the nick of time. 

The late Mother Angelica said this about prayer and I have always remembered it: 

"WHEN WE PRAY TO GOD OUR PRAYER NO MATTER WHAT THE WORDS ARE ASKING GOD IF HE LOVES US AND HIS ANSWER NO MATTER WHAT THE ANSWER IS, YES, NO, OR WAIT, IS THAT YES INDEED HE LOVES US."