Prayer

Tis the season for deep soul searching and reflection. From the sharing session at CANA we had not too long ago, many of us feel that our prayer life needed rejuvenation.

To be honest I've never really felt connected with God through prayer.

I don't what to pray about. And I don't like the idea of kneeling in front of picture of Jesus and Mother Mary racking my brains of what to say. It felt fake, because I was doing so out of obligation (don't pray is sin right?). After a while, I gave up.

Have you ever experienced one of those nights where by you've felt that you've an information overload from the reports or admin stuff you're settling at the computer that you just don't want to think anymore?
It was one of those nights for me. I shut off the lights and sat at my bed, feeling harassed and certainly not in sleep mode.
It was then I remembered the centering prayer we did at one of the earlier prayer meets conducted by Father Fred. At that time, my mind was too fried to do anything intelligent. But how difficult can it get to just focus on the word, 'Jesus'.

I didn't exactly go into the whole prayer, but that started the ball rolling for me.

The whole idea is just to be there for the Lord. The common misconception is that you must keep your tongue wagging in His presence for prayer to be considered prayer. But have you ever held a fruitful conversation with your friend by just talking non-stop? Our loving Father wants to hear about our lives from our own mouths, but He also wants to share His own. We want to have two-way communication with God.

So when I run out of things to tell the Lord I tell Him 'Speak Lord, Your servant is listening'. And I would sit in silence and wait for God's response.

It is wonderful, the things He does for us. That night, my hands felt a reassuring sense of warmness, as if He was caressing them and telling me everything was alright.

That night I snuggled into bed. I felt so loved and I could imagine myself being tucked into bed by a loving Daddy. It was the same feeling I had many many years ago, when I was still a little girl and I had to be patted to sleep by my real Father (I didn't have the privilege of knowing God then).

Ever since, I've spent time with God that way and I suppose, prayed in that way.

Its funny how God works because this started for me at the time Lent started and it wasn't an intentional effort that I made to 'communicate' with him. But what I think God wanted me to share with you is that personal prayer is not meant to be forced or unnatural.

God wants you to be comfortable when you speak to Him. Off the lights if you feel more 'in tune' that way. You don't have to say the words I've said. Develop your own style; God made each of us unique and connects with us in His own special way.

Prayer is God's invitation for you to share your life with him, because He loves you so much. So so much. More than you can ever imagine.

How fortunate are we to have a friend in Jesus!

Julia :) (eh let me know of any bad grammar hor, I composed this very quickly)