“What would happen if we prayed like it mattered?”
That was a question our new Fusion pastor David Stephens asked a couple of weeks ago. It’s one of those questions that convicts and challenges. I realize I don’t pray nearly as often as I should and with not nearly enough expectation that God will answer them. I try not to lace my prayers with selfish things because there are bigger problems in this world than my desire to get married, write a book, and move to Greece to work with the A21 campaign to rescue sex slaves. I tend to elevate the prayers for others over my prayers for myself almost as if my mere prayers don’t matter as much as someone else suffering more than me.
Even if I am suffering, the whisper of “someone else has it a lot worse than you” echoes in my head. I wasn’t praying like it mattered. I wasn’t praying like my prayers to my own Father mattered.
But they do matter. My prayers are powerful, yet delightfully pleasing to Him. Psalm 141:2 says “may my prayers be set before You like incense and the lifting of my hands be like an evening sacrifice.” When I come to God in heartfelt prayers and hands raised in worship, my actions are like the sweet smell of incense and my own personal sacrifice to the one who created me.
Pray like it matters because each prayer matters. Prayers cause a glorious stirring in Heaven and a fearful trembling in Hell. Prayers can heal the sick, save the lost, restore the poor in spirit, set the captives free, reconcile nations, cast out demons, mend broken families, calm the storms of life, redeem a generation, and give strength and hope to the weary.
Pray like it matters because it does matter.
Photo credit: Wayne Richardson
And you as His daughter are just as important as others are. The good thing about God is that He can never run out. His love can never run out. So we can ask for the desires of our heart (that line up with His desires) and He believes that matters. He crafted and shaped you in your mother’s womb just like He did them. YOU are His favorite child just like they are His favorite child. How is that possible? I don’t know, but I’m glad He’s bigger than our understanding and our problems. So He cares JUST as much about you as He does about them. Out of an overflowing heart of thankfulness that God loves US the way that He does, we can pray meaningfully that OTHERS will know the same thing.
Woah, where did that come from?? lol. I know you already know that, but just wanted to confirm it, I guess.
<3