Are your prayers scrambled?

 Over the past year and even longer, we have been requested to think of others in our prayers.  Many go through the motions.  They say yes and forget that they've said yes.  They say yes and have a list and go through that list.  We are all in a position where we often wonder if our prayers are being heard.  We fumble around with reason in an attempt to justify our thoughts and desires.

Many formulate their prayers using the "Lord's Prayer" as the guideline to follow.  There's nothing wrong with that.  In fact it is likely one of the first prayers we learn as kids.  As we grow up, we often seen prayer as a means to an end of selfishness.  We pray as if we are looking for something for ourselves.  I am not suggesting that we don't pray for our needs.  There's the word "needs".

Needs are important, but as we discuss our needs with God, we also should be expressing the needs of others.  But what are we looking for?  What do we really observe?  There are so many questions and studies done concerning prayer.  One study done in British Columbia, studied the condition of health for an individual in hospital.  A congregation, without advising the individual or their family, set aside a moment of prayer for the individual.  With in days the doctors noticed that the person in question was getting better.  Where doctors were sure there was no hope, hope surfaced.  

I remember my mother telling her then pastor, that she believed the church was no longer a praying church, looking for the betterment of the community, the needs of the community and not just the church and members of the church.  She saw a problem, she witnessed a "need" that was not being met.  In her way, she was disturbed at the direction the prayer life of the church was going.  Wednesday night prayer meeting was turning into another day for the minister to give a sermon and the prayer life of the church was becoming secondary.  I remember her telling the minister that the church was no longer a praying church.  The minister however, was more concerned that my parents might leave the church and take many of the seniors with them to where ever they would be attending, than he was at the warning my mother was giving him.

Prayer is a communication line.  It is important that we see prayer as a form of communication.  Prayer also gives the individual a sense of satisfied service and thus receive a sense of satisfaction.  There are many forms of prayer, and no one should limit themselves.  Some people need aids to their prayers.  This could be with a rosary, the wearing of a prayer shawl, holding onto a cross, holding their hands up in a gesture of giving and receiving.  While others place their hands on a prayer book as they pray, and others may even hold a "keepsake" of an individual they are praying for,  What is important is that prayer is an open line of communication between the individual and God.  That is the essence of prayer, an open line of communication.

So if the next time you pray, and your prayer appears to be scrambled as in the picture above, don't worry.  It will all be sorted out.