How to Pray

(Quick side note before I get to the 'real entry'. I confess that my favorite show of all time continues to be 'Friends', and I enjoy watching our DVD series any down time I get. With fasting on Tuesdays, I often feel like I have more 'down' time, hence, more 'Friends'. I turned an episode on even as I sat to write this entry and found that it took me about 10 minutes before I even typed the first word. Now I'm not saying that 'Friends' won't be back on in a little while as I complete some necessary chores, but I was reminded not to consider 'down time' on these days as something to be filled with activity that just passes the time, but to actually be in prayer, and ponder in my heart how this prayer and fasting is changing my heart and mind too- so I think I will make silence during this 'writing' time a priority. Thanks for listening, now on to what I was really intended to write about today)

You would think that if I started a blog about prayer and fasting, I should know something about praying, right? Well I wrote before that there are a lot of 'mountains' in my life that I thought only serious prayer and fasting could 'move', and today I am praying for one of those- a seriously ill, almost to the point of death, extended family member. And I have been hunbled to admit today that when it really counts in these tough instances, I am at a loss as to how to actually pray for him. I started with simply 'Thy will be done', but thought I was shorting his wife a bit, admitting that if it were my husband in this situation I would be fervently praying for healing, with just a touch of 'Thy will be done'. To be honest, I don't know this relative very well so it is hard to feel strongly one way or another whether God would be more glorified through him in death, or in life, but one thing I do know is, that is what God wants- to be glorified. I know too, that he has not yet known Jesus in any sense- Savior, Lord, Creator, Friend, despite being lovingly pursued by Him- so I am praying for that too.  It still all doesn't really add up to much, I feel, in the way of a 'good prayer', until I remember this verse:

"We do not know what we ought to prayer for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us wth groans that words cannot express" Romans 8:26

I feel convicted that sometimes I am trying too hard to think of and pray to solve the problems I feel I should pray/fast for on these Tuesdays, instead of simply dedicating myself to prayer- an actual interchange between myself and the Spirit of the Lord, letting Hm decide where my prayer is most needed in the world.

Praying For:  God to speak to us about how to pray...specifically in times of sickness and death, and especially for my relative.