Sometimes I'll kneel down to pray with a list of requests in my mind and then tell myself, “God won't give you that, so ask for something more reasonable.”
And so I start editing my prayers by deleting stuff that might require a miracle. For example, I know a special-needs boy, 8, who hasn’t learned to talk yet. There’s also a sweet little girl who’s been blind from birth.
I would love to pray for the boy to start talking and for the little girl’s eyes to be opened, but something stops me. And so, instead of asking for things requiring soul-shaking evidence of God’s majesty and power, I beg for simpler stuff.
I keep it all safe and tidy, as in “Please help so-and-so find a husband” or “Please help me be more patient.”
I’m starting to realize, however, that editing prayers shows a lack of faith. It’s a way of second-guessing God and trying to do his work for him.
As a Christian, I believe Christ was a divine being capable of healing lepers and raising people from the dead.
So why can’t he cure an autistic child today? Or give sight to the blind?
Of course I realize many prayers aren’t answered in the ways we envision. And maybe we edit our prayers because we suspect God will say no.
But I still think we should step out on a limb and pray for our hearts’ deepest longings. That seems to be the true essence of faith.
I wonder how many people ask for a mere crumb when they truly want a whole loaf. Or pray for a few drops of rain when they’re yearning for a gully washer.
And here’s the odd part: When we hide what we deeply desire, we aren’t fooling God, since he knows every corner of our hearts.
Some folks don’t think God still works miracles today. They say all that miraculous stuff happened in biblical times, but not any longer.
Still, there are wondrous stories of healing today, cases where doctors shake their heads at phenomena science can’t explain.
When Jesus walked the earth, people of deep faith approached him and asked for seemingly impossible things.
There was a man whose daughter was dying, for example, and he asked Jesus to visit her. But on the way there, news came that the child had died.
Jesus went anyway and found a crowd there who mocked him. You can imagine them saying, “She’s obviously dead, so what can you do?”
But the Lord spoke two words to her and she sat up.
As for me, I’m trying to stop editing my prayers. I’m asking for things skeptics would call impossible.
I’ll pray for the blind to see and for the mute to speak. And then I’ll trust God to take it from there.
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Lorraine Murray’s latest books include “Death in the Choir” and “Death of a Liturgist,” mysteries set at a fictional church in Decatur. She also has written “The Abbess of Andalusia,” a biography of Flannery O’Connor. Her email is lorrainevmurray@yahoo.com.
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