Preparing for my next trip to Haiti, I am impressed with the topic of communication with God.\u00a0 It is something I need to learn more about.\u00a0 This approach seems to work pretty well.\u00a0 God shows me something I need to learn and I share my learning experience with others.\u00a0 That said, I invite anyone reading here to chime in with your thoughts on the subject.\u00a0 You can reply to posts, or add replies to the Haiti retreat page I have created.\u00a0\u00a0 Today’s case-in-point is the following.<\/p>\n
I have often been taught that we should pray for others.\u00a0 In fact, there are many places in scripture where\u00a0we are taught that we should.\u00a0 But somehow I have\u00a0gotten the impression that praying for myself is selfish.\u00a0\u00a0 That it should be “saved for last,” keeping God and others top priority in my prayers.\u00a0\u00a0 I think that may be wrong.\u00a0 Jesus was asked how we should pray, so he gave an example.\u00a0 The first part of the sample prayer was recognizing the greatness of God.\u00a0 The rest of the prayer was all about . . . me.\u00a0\u00a0 Sure the prayer says “us,”\u00a0 but I am certainly one of “us.”\u00a0 Give\u00a0us our daily bread.\u00a0 Forgive us our sins.\u00a0 Lead us not into temptation.\u00a0 Deliver us from evil.<\/p>\n
As another example:\u00a0 In the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus takes some disciples with him to prepare for the cross that is ahead.\u00a0 He asks them to pray.\u00a0 If it were me about to go through an ordeal, I would be saying “Boys, you guys pray for me!\u00a0 Pray hard!\u00a0\u00a0 Pray loud!\u00a0 Ask God to deliver me from this trial!”\u00a0 Instead, he tells them to pray for themselves.\u00a0 Pray that they won’t “enter into temptation.”<\/p>\n
So, here’s my thesis:\u00a0 Praying for others won’t do much good unless\u00a0my relationship with God is right.\u00a0 Therefore, humbly pray for\u00a0myself first, then\u00a0I will be able to pray more effectively for others.\u00a0<\/p>\n
If I am wrong on this, please pray in\u00a0your<\/em>\u00a0prayers\u00a0that God will set me straight.\u00a0 I will certainly be praying the same . . . for myself<\/em>.\u00a0 \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n See Mathew 6:5-15, Luke 22:39-40<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Preparing for my next trip to Haiti, I am impressed with the topic of communication with God.\u00a0 It is something I need to learn more about.\u00a0 This approach seems to work pretty well.\u00a0 God shows me something I need to learn and I share my learning experience with others.\u00a0 That said, I invite anyone reading […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-consider"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1417"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1417\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1418,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1417\/revisions\/1418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}