I pray...

I pray because I love the Lord.

Nelson Mandela
United a Nation

What a gift we are given to be able to speak to our maker on a daily  basis and know with a surety that He is listening. I mean think of it! Think of someone you look up to, someone of high position, someone who is the best or the greatest in their field of expertise. For me I think of someone such as Nelson Mandela or William Wilberforce. Men who made a difference in the world and left their mark.

 Now if I wanted to talk to them personally, (well first I would have to bring them back from the dead....but pretend they are still alive) I

William Wilberforce
Brought about the abolition
of the slave trade

would have to get in contact with their secretary and attempt to set up a visit, have a good enough reason that would warrant me, a commoner, to visit with him, a man of such high status. And then if that indeed did happen I am sure I would have to go through extensive security check and background check so that the people protecting them would know I wasn't a bad guy or anything. After all that I would gain an audience with them. But then whose to say they are going to actually be interested in what I have to say. They might just write me off as some silly girl who knows nothing about anything and is wasting their valuable time talking about insignificant things. And to think these men are not even comparable to the maker of heaven and earth. How incredible it is that we can talk with Him daily and we don't have to go through all of that. We don't have to have a back ground check...in fact men or women who would not be allowed an audience with someone of high position here on earth are the ones God wants to talk to!

Now some of you may be saying, "but I don't think that God even listens to me." I am here to tell you.....you are wrong. I know without any doubt in my brain or heart that God hears your prayers and that he cares about you and what you are going through. He cares about the small things in our lives just as much as the big. He doesn't write us off as some silly person with insignificant hardships. He sees us as we truly are and knows completely how we feel and knows how much these things mean to us and in return they mean a lot to Him. My mission president used to say, "God is in the details of our lives." I can testify that is 100% true.

"...Look unto God with firmness of mind,

and pray unto him with exceeding faith,

and he will console you in your afflictions,

and he will plead your cause,

and send down justice upon those who seek

your destruction.......receive the pleasing word of God

and feast upon his love..."

Jacob 3:1-2

You may also be thinking, "yeah you can only say that because you must have had some miraculous answer to your prayer once..." I haven't actually. I don't believe in prayer because of the miracles that come. I pray because I love the Lord. I love my Father in Heaven so much that I want to talk with Him. What better way to get to know somebody than to talk to them! In return God does speak to me...but it might not be the way you think. I don't hear voices and I don't have visions.....I can feel Him as I pray. Peace comes over me as I
talk with Him. Imagine if you will the joy that you feel as you witness the beauty of a morning sunrise, or the joy of a mother seeing her baby for the first time, or the peace you feel as your breath is swept away in an elegant painting....those types of feelings come over me as I talk with my Father in Heaven. That is how He speaks to me.

I pray because I love the Lord. But He speaks back because He loves me.