Tag Archives: Pray

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How to Pray When Life is Hard

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Much of our lives are spent avoiding pain. And it makes sense because no one likes being in pain or difficulty. It makes sense that when it comes to our faith journey, we focus on the parts about joy, celebration, and happier feelings.

But that leaves us wondering what we do with our pain. What do we do when life hurts? When relationships become hard? How do we handle the difficult moments? How do we walk with a friend through difficult moments?

When they happen, we are usually unprepared for them; at least, I am. We often expect God to keep us from those situations and feelings; we expect God to bless our faithfulness when that blessing means ease and things going up and to the right.

But we see a different story through Scripture. We see that while pain and suffering are not God’s original design, they are part of living in a fallen, broken world. No one, including Jesus, is immune to pain and difficulty. We must learn how to navigate those moments and how they shape and impact our faith. God has given us ways to do that through the Psalms of Lament.

According to John Calvin, “The Psalms are the anatomy of all the parts of the soul. There is no human emotion that anyone finds in himself whose image is not reflected in this mirror. All our griefs, sorrows, fears, misgivings, hopes, cares, anxieties.” 

The Psalms are the anatomy of all the parts of the soul. There is no human emotion that anyone finds in himself whose image is not reflected in this mirror. All our griefs, sorrows, fears, misgivings, hopes, cares, anxieties. -John Calvin

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The Bible has space for our feelings of grief, disillusionment, and heartache, so our faith needs to as well. But many of us today focus on happier feelings in the modern church. 

To help with that, I encourage you to write your own lament. A lament has a few parts: Invocation, complaint, affirmation of trust, petition, statement of confidence, and vow of praise. 

The Bible has space for our feelings of grief, disillusionment, and heartache, so our faith needs to as well.

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Invocation

This is where you ask for help. Here are some questions to consider: 

  • Who are you addressing? This might seem obvious, but we must know who we are addressing. The Psalms of Lament focus on the character and power of God. We must remind ourselves who God is and what he has promised to do. 
  • What are you asking for? Is it for sleep, peace, dealing with fear or anxiety?
  • This is also a place to remind ourselves of what God has done in the past. List out how God has moved in your life and faith journey or the lives of others. In lament, we often only focus on our pain and grief, so our hearts must be reminded of what God has done. 

Complaint

This part can be hard for many of us because it can feel “un-Christian,” but this is an important part of the lament. We have complaints, grief, and heartache to bring before God. He won’t strike you dead. The psalms are filled with complaints. People even complained to Jesus, like when Lazarus died and Martha came to Jesus and said, “If you had been here, our brother wouldn’t have died” (John 11:21). That’s a complaint.

It is okay to complain to God in prayers of lament.

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Things to think through are:

  • What is the problem? The issue that you are facing. 
  • What is your complaint?
  • What do you think God has not done?

Part of the complaint in many psalms is also a time to confess our sins to God.

Affirmation of Trust

This is the place where we look to why we can trust God. What has God promised in his word? As you think of your complaint, what God has promised speaks to that. Here are some examples of promises of God. 

Petition

This is the place where we ask God. Questions to help with this part are: 

  • What are we asking God to do?
  • What are we asking God to heal or to deliver us from?
  • Be specific in how you are asking God to move.

Often, I think we aren’t specific in our prayers because we don’t want to be disappointed if God doesn’t do something. But we must pray specifically. 

Statement of Confidence

This is the place of hope. This is where we say, “God, I know you can answer. I know you can heal. I know you can change this person or situation.” 

Vow of Praise

Many psalms end with a verse of praise. Even if God doesn’t do as I ask or on my timetable, I will still serve and praise Him. 

How to write your own psalm of lament.

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5 Questions About Prayer

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One of the questions many people wrestle with is, “Does prayer work?” Many of us have prayed for something: healing, a wound to be taken away, a relationship to be restored, only to have it not answered.

We have also seen moments when we prayed for something, and that prayer wasn’t answered the way we expected it.

This leaves us to ask, “Does prayer work? Is prayer even worth the time and effort?”

In James 5:13 – 20, James lays out how to pray, the role of the unconfessed in prayers, and how a church should gather to pray together.

This passage is often used to pray for the sick, which it is about. But the word for sick in James 5 doesn’t just mean physically ill but also includes spiritual and emotional weakness. This is one reason James uses the example of Elijah because Elijah was spiritually and emotionally weak in 1 Kings. That idea completely changed my thoughts about this passage and my prayer life as I prepped this message. 

In chapter 5, James gives us five questions to ask so that we can see prayer be more effective in our lives: 

5 reasons why prayer doesn’t work.

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Are you self-made and have little need for God? Many of us are self-made, able to work hard, strategic thinkers, or people who can feel our way out of things.

Without realizing it, we create lives that have little need for the power of God.

This begs the question of when we start praying about something and how long it takes us to ask God for help.

Do you see the hard and good times as things God has allowed? In James 5, James talks about Job and Elijah as examples for us to understand his point. Job said, “God gives, and God takes; blessed be the name of the Lord.” James wants us to see how this interacts with our prayers. Do we see the good and the hard as from God? Or just the hard?

Do you pray for your will and not God’s? Jesus taught his disciples in Matthew 6 that when they pray, they are to pray for God’s will, not their own.

But one of our frustrations with prayer is that God doesn’t answer us on our timetable or the way we want.

This is the crux of prayer. Because we will often ask for A, and God gives us B. The question we have to wrestle with is, do we believe God heard us? Do we believe God spoke to the other person? This is when we are reminded how little control we have in life, and that’s hard. 

Do you pray specifically? I know it can be scary to pray specifically because I am opening myself up to being let down or opening myself up to potential doubts and struggles. What if I ask for this specific healing and don’t get it? What if I ask God to do this or that, and it doesn’t happen?

That’s hard. 

But the example that James uses is Elijah, who was a man who prayed specifically. He was also a very flawed man, which is also incredibly encouraging. 

Do you live in unconfessed sin? Unconfessed sin creates a barrier between you, God, and others. And James tells us it is a hindrance to our prayer lives. James connects the confession of sin to answered prayer and healing. 

This is important because the healing we are promised is spiritual, physical, and emotional, but we aren’t promised when that healing will come, just that we will have it. 

5 questions to ask about your prayer life.

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How to Make the Most of Your Morning Routine

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If you have kids (even if you don’t), the morning can be crazy. You stayed up too late watching that last episode on Netflix or the game, hit the snooze button too much, and now you are racing out the door, throwing lunches together, and stuffing breakfast into your mouth.

There is a lot at stake in what we do with our mornings. The most productive people maximize their mornings.

Here’s the reality: If you don’t make the most of your morning, you will feel behind all day.

If you don’t make the most of your morning, you will feel behind all day.

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If your morning determines your day, how do you make the most of it?

Here are six ideas:

6 ways to make the most of your morning.

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1. Get up before everyone. If you want to make the most of your morning, whether single, married, or have kids, you must get up before everyone else. It would help if you were up before people started sending you texts and emails.

Something happens in the quietness of a morning when it is still dark out.

I know you are exhausted and not a morning person. I get it.

When we started our church, I would work late into the night because I hated the mornings, but the reality is that most people do their best work and best thinking in the morning. I certainly do. 

There is a definite difference in my day when I am up before everyone else and when I am not.

Parents know this truth because they feel behind if they wake up when their kids do.

2. Pick a spot. The place is vital to many people, particularly when it comes to focusing on your heart. Choosing a location you return to each morning to recharge, focus, and pray is essential.

This might be a porch, a spot in your room, or a favorite chair.

Wherever it is, don’t simply make this haphazard. Choose a spot that will help to quiet you and focus your heart.

The consistency of a spot and place will signal in your mind that it is time to relax, think, and connect with Jesus. This becomes a very powerful part of maximizing your time.

3. Read/Journal. Focusing on your day will often come through feeding your soul first.

For me, it is spending time reading my Bible. Being able to have space to read, process, and write down what God is doing in your heart and mind is critical.

What things stand out to you while reading your Bible? Write them down.

Many people find a lot of relief from getting their thoughts and feelings out of their minds and onto paper. This is often a great stress reliever but also a place to leave something behind. You can also track what you are praying for and when those prayers are answered.

4. Pray/Think. In the busyness of life, especially with kids, if you want to have time to pray and think in silence, you will have to carve it out. This is why you need to get up before everyone else. If you want quiet, you have to make it happen. Quiet does not magically find you.

Quiet does not magically find you; you must plan it.

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If you are a leader, this is very important.

Part of your job as a leader is thinking and praying about what is next for your organization, church, and family. As a parent, you must believe and pray about what is next for your marriage and your kids.

Recently, an older leader challenged me on this and said, “Josh, if you don’t spend time thinking and praying about what is next for your church, who do you think is?”

5. Tackle your most challenging task first. If you’ve noticed, you haven’t done any work yet. For many people, you might be wondering when you start being productive.

But I would say that all of the above will bring greater productivity and success.

As you think through your day, do what takes the most mental energy, the most challenging task that will move the ball the furthest in your life and career, first.

For many pastors and me, this is sermon prep, not a meeting or a counseling session. Tackle the tasks that are not only hard but move the ball furthest in your life or work.

6. Turn on the electronics. Notice: This is last; depending on how long everything else took you, it might be until lunchtime before you check email, Facebook, or Instagram. That isn’t bad (unless your boss would be mad at you about checking your email that late, which is a different topic). Side note, if your boss doesn’t like that, have a conversation about how you can be more productive if you don’t check your email first thing in the morning.

Why does that help?

An email has a way of hijacking your day and brain. It sidetracks you. I don’t check my email on sermon prep mornings until I am done. It keeps my head clear.

6 ideas to make the most of your morning.

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In reality, no one else is responsible for making you successful, effective, or productive. You are. If you aren’t, as much as we don’t want to admit it, that is often on us.

Take control of what you can control.

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How to Pray to the God who Protects & Meets us in our Fear

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The book of Psalms is one of the most beloved books in the Bible, and for a good reason. It speaks directly to our situations. It speaks to our hopes, dreams, fears, loss, and disappointments. Athanasius said, “Most Scripture speaks to us; the Psalms speak for us.”

Most Scripture speaks to us; the Psalms speak for us. -Athanasius

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But the Psalms are not just about us and how we connect to God. The Psalms also give us a clear picture of who God is, what God does, and what God is like. They show us a close God who redeems, who will make all things new, who forgives, and hears us.

Psalm 27 shows us what we do with our fear. Where is God when life is scary? When things feel overwhelming and we aren’t sure we can move forward in faith?

The Lord is my light and my salvation—

    whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the stronghold of my life—

    of whom shall I be afraid?

2 When the wicked advance against me

    to devour me,

it is my enemies and my foes

    who will stumble and fall.

3 Though an army besiege me,

    my heart will not fear;

though war break out against me,

    even then, I will be confident.

I’ve often wondered with this Psalm, is David trying to pump himself up? Just reminding himself of God’s power and security?

There are seasons where we have to speak the truth, the truth that we know, and maybe preach to others and preach it to ourselves. We forget. This is one reason communion is such an important practice. We must remind ourselves of God’s grace and forgiveness. We must remind ourselves of God’s compassionate love.

In Scripture, light symbolizes well-being and safety. Darkness symbolizes danger. David is expressing his confidence in God’s power. He is saying that God is someone that can be trusted.

4 One thing I ask from the Lord,

    this only do I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord

    all the days of my life,

to gaze on the beauty of the Lord

    and to seek him in his temple.

5 For in the day of trouble

    he will keep me safe in his dwelling;

he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent

    and set me high upon a rock.

6 Then my head will be exalted

    above the enemies who surround me;

at his sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy;

    I will sing and make music to the Lord.

The dwelling place of God, the presence of God, the light of God is the safe place. It is the place where fear is answered.

The dwelling place of God, the presence of God, the light of God is the safe place. It is the place where fear is answered.

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So David is seeking his presence, the place of the dwelling of God. Because we know when we seek God’s presence we will find him (Jeremiah 29:13.) God will not hide. God wants to be with us. God wants us in his presence. Dwelling carries it with a picture of intimacy, closeness. This is something that is all over the psalms.

But when we are with God we are safe. He will hide us, he will shelter us from the storm. This doesn’t mean we don’t experience the storm, we do. It just means we are not alone in the storm. We don’t face it without the power and presence of God.

We don’t face the storms of life without the power and presence of God.

We don’t face the storms of life without the power and presence of God.

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We know this from Psalm 91, that God hides us, like a mother bird hiding her young under her wing (Psalm 91:4.) To get to us the storms of life must go through the hand of God.

7 Hear my voice when I call, Lord;

    be merciful to me and answer me.

8 My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”

    Your face, Lord, I will seek.

9 Do not hide your face from me,

    do not turn your servant away in anger;

    you have been my helper.

Do not reject me or forsake me,

    God my Savior.

And yet, David gives voice to an ache we often experience. Because we can’t see God, we wonder if he is there. If God doesn’t protect the way we think He should, or doesn’t move on the timetable we think he should, we ask, “Are you there? Do you hear me?”

What we aren’t told is if God answers David’s specific prayer in this Psalm or if it is in the time he wants.

My guess is, based on verses 13 – 14, he doesn’t.

13 I remain confident of this:

    I will see the goodness of the Lord

    in the land of the living.

14 Wait for the Lord;

    be strong and take heart

    and wait for the Lord.

No matter what, I wait. I remain confident. I trust in you. I will see your goodness. I don’t see it all yet, but I will.

I will wait. I will wait.