I've never been good at opening up to anyone, including God. In the past few months, I have made a much more concerted effort to do so in my prayers. One hindrance, I think is that I know God knows my mind and my heart, and he can hear all of my heartfelt thoughts and desires. So, why do I need to vocalize them?
Prayer is a sacred and personal experience, and I sometimes get nervous--or bashful, rather--when praying aloud in the presence of others. I learned recently not to allow that to happen anymore. Here's what happened:
It was a Friday evening, and my friend and I were at her house, putting ice on her injured leg. I was not having a pleasant evening, but I was calm because I was with my best friend. By my own fault, we had just been in an accident in which her leg was badly bruised, and after stopping at the gas station for ice, I returned to her home to discover I had lost my wallet. As you can imagine, I was feeling pretty discouraged.
We knelt in prayer. I felt prompted by the Spirit of the Lord as to what I should say in that prayer, and some of those promptings--to my eternal regret--I ignored. As we knelt there together, and I spoke the words of the prayer, I was overcome with gratitude for my blessings. I expressed my thanks to the Lord for our safety, and that she had not been injured badly, and asked His blessing that she might recover quickly. I then felt impressed to express my gratitude and love for her. I only did that halfway...muttering some generic phrase about our thankfulness for our friendship. What I felt prompted to say, but didn't, follows:
"Lord, I thank thee for [my best friend]. I thank thee for her safety. I wish it could have been my leg that was hurt in the accident, and not hers. Father she is the most precious thing I have in my life, and I value her safety, her well-being and her happiness above all else. Please bless her to know how deeply I feel for her--how much she means to me, how happy I am to have her love and friendship, and bless her to be patient with my shortcomings as I strive to live worthy of her."
Yeah...you might see why I left that part out. But, I shouldn't have. I should have prayed what was in my heart. I didn't care about my wallet, or about my bike. I only cared about her.
So, I have a new resolve to always pray what's in my heart, regardless of who else is around.
2 comments:
ive always had the same problem, i feel that most of my prayers are too personal to say aloud even when theyre for blessing the food or just an opening.
but, i ran across a scripture that said "pray vocally as well as in private" and that kind of made me think. there was someone in conference that said the same...cant remember who (id have to look at my notes)
Thanks for these very personal thoughts.
I was in the temple thinking about the pain I was going through that day and all I could think about was to be thankful for this very experience.
Needless to say I had to ask "WHAT!" but then I took a big gulp and did so.
I can't explain how but things worked out.
I learned that no matter how insignificant or stupid I feel, I'm always the number 1 priority in Heavenly Father's eyes.
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