itsawonderfilledlife

One of the things that drew me to the church we now call home is the time in the service when a person emerges before the congregation and offer up the prayers of the people.

Prayers are offered for our immediate church family as well as the church worldwide, the community in which we live as well as the global community. For ministries in our church, the people who perform the ministries as well as those who benefit from them. Thanks for who God is, for the life we have been given, for the opportunities to be his hands and feet are spoken. Acknowledgement of our need of him, his wisdom, his eyes, his grace.

I am so thankful for the importance placed on corporate prayer that covers people, places and happenings both near and far.

The other day I felt like I had lived a day of prayers of the people.

There was beauty and appreciation for the life I have been so fortunate to live. The people who have added to my life, the activities, the work, the world in which I live.

Then there were the joys of others, prayers answered in the most spectacular of ways. Events that enfolded in a such a way that one could not help but acknowledge that God had his hand in the the details.

There were tears too, for hurts and struggles and disappointments in the lives of others. People who were experiencing fear, loneliness, heartache … pain. People who I could only help by laying their burdens at the feet of the only wise God.

Lord, hear my prayer …

These words are often prayed in corporate prayer and I have begun to use them as I pray.

We see these words at the start of Psalm 143, one of the penitential psalms.

It is not a demand, but a question, a request.

These four words remind us that it is we who are the ones asking to be heard, asking for help, for mercy.

The Matthew Henry Commentary, for this verse says,

“We have no righteousness of our own to plead, therefore must plead God’s righteousness, and the word of promise which he has freely given us, and caused us to hope in.”

We are never enough on our own, but through the blood of Jesus we can speak to the God of the universe, making our supplications to Him. It is an act that is an honor and a responsibility.

When we lift up our prayers to God nothing is news to him, for he is all knowing. Yet we lift them up as an offering, as an act of complete trust … trust that he can and will oversee the cries of our heart, trust in the process that he chooses.

Lord, hear our prayer.