How Do You Pray?

Do you pray safe? When you pray do you ask God to change things or do you ask him to change you? When we ask him to change us, it can be very dangerous.

A couple of weeks ago I listened to a message online by Craig Groeschel. Most of the content below is from his message. I’m sharing this because I decided to pray the same prayer for a week and was quite astonished by what was revealed to me.

The Prayer: Search me God and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me in the way everlasting. Psalm 139: 23-24

 

Search Our Heart- When you ask God to search your heart, you may find things that you not like. We all think that we have a “good” heart, but we don’t. Jer. 17:9- the heart is deceitful above all things. Who can understand it? Without Christ, we are wicked. And with Christ, we still lie to ourselves. We hide the impure things deep. Asking God to search our heart is asking him to dig out these impurities that pollute us.

Test Me God– Show me where my anxieties hide. In other words, what are you afraid of? What you fear the most reveals where you trust God the least! You can’t be driven by fear, you have to be led by faith.  You can’t please God when you are driven by fear.  Fear will keep you from walking in obedience.

Uncover My Sins– Show me where my life is displeasing to you. We accuse others and excuse ourselves. It’s not typically big things in this area. It’s the small things that we overlook in ourselves. It’s these little things that become the heart issues.   Ask yourself, What are others trying to tell me?

Lead Me– When we allow God to search us, test us and uncover these sins, then we are in the place to allow him to lead us. He will lead us in grace. He will lead us in the way that is everlasting.

What God showed me is very difficult to share. Everyday last week, numerous times I sincerely prayed that God would search my heart and my mind and show me what I have hidden. He showed me that although I talk a lot about trusting him, I don’t always trust. He pointed out that I am still anxious about the future and that although I’m saying the right things; in my heart and in my mind I am fearful. I am so scared for my child and I haven’t completely given it over to God. This is hard for me to admit. I honestly don’t know how to do this, but I am committing to working on it. It is essential for me to trust him in this area. He showed me that I have held a grudge against a family member. I have held strong and have chosen to “be right rather than kind”.  I know that this is terrible. If we have to choose, we should always choose kind. The family member that I have stood my ground with is not a Christian and I have set a terrible example. I have to make this right. Also, I have a co-worker/boss that is always telling me that I “mother” everyone. I realized that he’s not telling me this in a way that is a compliment. Mothering comes natural to me and I do not mean to be offensive, but I realized that I have offended him. I am going to be more careful about how I say things.

God showed me things that I need to deal with and turn over to him. My heart is holding bitterness, distrust in my God, and a spirit of haughtiness. I am not proud of these things, but I am going to strive to change them. I’m going to pray for God’s guidance in each of these situations.

 

I urge you, to ask God to search you and test you.  It is not a safe prayer. It will show you the ugliness that you hide from the world and from yourself. But when he cleans all of that out and cleans us up, then we can ask him to lead us in grace and on the path that leads to his everlasting love.