Does it matter what we pray for?
Do I have a right to ask something of God when I already enjoy so many blessings? Am I somehow becoming greedy when I pray for something for myself? Isn’t it silly to request small favors from God when so many big problems loom over our world?
Pious as they may sound, these questions actually reveal our hesitancy to be personal with the Lord. Can we really fool ourselves into believing that we are doing God a service by filtering out our “frivolous whims” so that the Lord can be unencumbered in solving the “important dilemmas”?
Matthew records the Lord’s Prayer as an example of the divine invitation to intimacy. Matthew 6:6 instructs: “Find a quiet, secluded place so you won’t be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace” (The Message).
Since God knows what we’re thinking already, there’s no use trying to censor out whatever desires we find unseemly. The primary thing God wants for us and knows we need is the sense of being “at home” with the divine.
Not only are we off the hook for finding the right words, we can voice whatever comes to mind as long as it also comes from our heart. God will do the filtering for us, redirecting us to what is important – where the Lord knows we need sustaining, as well as pushing to do holy work.
It doesn’t matter what we pray for as long as we start the conversation with God. That begins when we get “over ourselves” and how we think we “should” pray and get down to being ourselves in the presence of our Lord.
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