The Ongoing Lesson of Prayer

I am often reminded of how important of the Lord's prayer is. Even though praying is about God, my selfishness takes over and makes it about me. Taking the focus off of God, I think about how He is going to speak to me, or my needs, or countless other things that are focused on me, but that's not what prayer is about. God knows our needs and he does want us to bring those before him and he does and will provide.

Since the beginning of this year, what seems to grab my attention in praying is wondering how God will speak to me. For some people, they hear God or get visions and I sometimes wonder why God doesn't speak to me in those ways, but I have mistaken the complete absence of clear words or visions to mean that God is not speaking to me at all. That is definitely not true. This has been something that I have struggled with because I have limited God to only speaking in those ways. I have come to realize through praying is that God leads me in different ways and is speaking to me. The Bible is God's word and he is speaking to us through it. God's words are there for us and I shouldn't be thinking that God is not speaking to me.

My prayers should not be half focused on what I'm praying and half focused on how he might speak to me. My focus should be on Jesus. Even though I struggle with that distortion of prayer, the Lord's prayer is here to teach us what prayer is and why we pray. It is a lesson that I am continually learning.