Praying in the Moment

    I once heard a sermon by Mark Driscoll (one of my favorite pastors to listen to) that talked about prayer. He said when you tell someone "I'll pray for you", you are not only making a promise to them, you are making a promise to God. Why had I never looked at it like that? How many times have I told someone I would pray for them and just as quickly as I said it, I forgot to say a prayer. Time goes by and you remind yourself "Oh yeah, pray for this person for this struggle" and you still don't pray.

    In the last year, prayer has come up so much in my daily life. I remember a little over a year ago, if someone asked me to pray in front of people, I would freeze. My palms would start to sweat, I would get that big lump in my throat, I would stutter and get nervous that I would say something wrong. Then after a sermon at church, I realized what prayer really was. It is a conversation between God and I. It does not matter if I "pray well" in other people's opinion. It does not matter if I stutter or stumble over words. It does not matter if I forget to say something and add it in at the end. God knows what is on my heart and the moment I realized God does not judge my prayers, I didn't care what other people thought of them either.

    After hearing what Mark Driscoll said about making a promise to God, I took it as a challenge. I am challenging myself to pray in the moment. If I am talking to someone who is going through something, instead of saying "I'll pray for you", I will challenge myself to say "can I pray with you now?" If that person is texting me, I will challenge myself to put down the phone and pray in that moment. I also keep a pad of paper at my desk and when I hear someone is having a hard day, I write their name down and bring that paper home and pray for those people.

    I was talking to someone today who said that she uses her Facebook news feed as a tool. When someone's name comes up, she prays for them. She said "I don't always know what their struggle is, but God does". She is right. God knows what the people we pray for are going through. Psalm 145: 18 says "The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth." God wants us to call on him. Not just in the bad times, but to praise him in the good. When we call on him, he is near. What a comfort.

    So my goal for myself is to pray in the moment. Keep track of those in my life who need prayer. No more empty promises to God. What tools will you use to better your prayer life?