Prayer is done best with persistence. Through the Lord's Prayer of Jesus, the gospel of Matthew chapter 6, Christians understand our relationship with God like Jesus’, like a loving parent and child, it is the persistent nurturing, the persistent checking in, the persistent trusting, that develops a solid foundation of faith when trials come. Practicing and pausing to pray at least every day can enable us to bear the trials of life with so much more hope than what we could ever have done on our own. Said John Wesley, “Get on your knees because much depends upon God.” Prayer connects us with the power that is essential to our survival.
Perhaps when we look at prayer in this manner we aren’t so focused on the answer to our prayers. I have worked with a number of people who won’t pray or don’t believe in prayer because they don’t choose to believe that God answers. Have you run into this too? This has been a hurdle for me, that is, until I experienced an answer to prayer I had not expected. I remember vividly as at twelve getting chicken pox. Oh, the itching and the scratching, unbearable so much so one night I couldn’t sleep. I left my bedroom and came down to the living room of my family’s home. I was miserable. I didn’t know what to do other than to pray: “God, take the chickenpox away and give them to someone else!” I admit I had a little maturing to do in my prayer life.
At the side of our sofa and I prayed. Would God answer? I must have been rather loud in my praying because soon I heard footsteps on the stairs; I saw my mom turn the corner. She wasn’t the answer to my prayer or so I thought. She looked at me, went to the bathroom, took out some calamine lotion. She knew it would ease my sores just long enough to get me back upstairs and back into bed. I didn’t care. The lotion was soothing, calming to my soul. The chicken pox was not gone but there was an answer to prayer. Did I choose to accept what it was?
