Prayer

Alone With Jesus

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And after six days Jesus took with Him, Peter, James and John and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And He was transfigured before them. Mark 9:2 ESV

One of my favorite hymns begins with the line, “I come to the garden alone.” I often think of those words as I go on my morning walks and as I sit to read the Bible with my first cup of coffee. Today’s verse might make you think you need to go up a mountain, to please God. But what Jesus was really asking, was for Peter, James, and John to be alone, with Him, so they could hear the Father’s voice. That makes me wonder when the last time was that my heart was quiet enough to hear HIs voice. God does not always lead us up mountains. Sometimes our path leads through the valley of the shadow of death, or the garden of Gethsemane, but wherever we find ourselves today, what is most important is to listen to Him there.

Because what matters is not just being alone – what counts is being alone with Jesus. Even if we began today so busy that we did not hear His voice, He still offers us an invitation come and be alone with Him. Whether sitting in a garden, climbing a mountain, or carrying a cross, when we walk with Him and talk with Him, He shares a joy with us that no one else has known. Listen for His voice. Today, He wants to be alone with you!

Music of Our Hearts

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Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. Proverbs 4:23 NIV

Today as I approach my seventy-fourth year, I am grateful to still be able play my guitar and sing for several long-term care facilities around our community. Strangely, my musical adventures began, not with guitar, but with six years of clarinet lessons. Because my Stepfather was a clarinetist, he chose that instrument for me as well and began teaching me beginning when I was about six. I am grateful now, but at that age, I was less than overjoyed to be down in our basement squawking away through clarinet lessons, while my friends were outside playing baseball. Through those years of what felt like endless practicing my dream was of a world without lessons. Oh, how I hated that instrument then, but today I am grateful for the discipline and the lifetime of music that those tedious lessons have given me.

Photo by Jose De la ossa on Pexels.com

In the same way, the spiritual discipline of prayer helps to prepare us for the challenges that life throws our way. Just as I was able to share precious moments, while my dad was in his final hours, by being able to play my guitar for him, so prayer prepares us to be used by God in the ordinary things of everyday life. Though, the discipline of practicing is unloved by children, they do not realize that childhood is the perfect time for them to learn. In the same way the discipline of prayer, especially when we are young, prepares our hearts for the battles that lie ahead in adulthood. The hours we spend in God’s practice room of prayer, will help prepare us for both our greatest joys and deepest sorrows, our biggest successes and most bitter defeats. Music and prayer are precious gifts, but how we practice those gifts is our choice. The Bible tells us to carefully guard our hearts, and there is no better way to guard them than by prayer. God knows that this discipline, though at times feels tedious, will teach us to play a melody in life that will echo the music of Heaven and the song of the redeemed!

A Time for Praise

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 Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. James 5:13 ESV

The other day as we looked at the hymn, “Sweet Hour of Prayer,” I wrote about the times when we need to simply fall to our knees and watch with the Lord in our own Garden of Gethsemane. But there are also times when God delights in a tidal wave of praise and gratitude, such as James describes here. There are few places where such praise seems more out of place than a long-term care facility, but my friends there teach me that sometimes there is nothing better than good old-fashioned hand-clapping praise. Last week, they showed us just how that is done, when as my former pastor used to say, “If you can’t clap on that song, your arm must be broken!” I do hope that whatever situation you find yourself in this Thanksgiving, that you will find a way to praise, whether in health or sickness, surrounded by family or alone in your room, because God loves us and sent His only Son, to pray for us, heal us, wash away our sins and to die in our place. How can we not find times of joyful abandon to simply: “Call Him Up” – “Have a Little Talk With Jesus,” and tell Him that we are the ones who are “Standing in the Need of Prayer?”