{Prayer}

From today, I have exactly 22 days until I go back to Mississippi to begin my second semester of college. I have been hoping, thinking and praying that this break will be one of renewal and restoration. I am beyond thankful that I finished my first semester without too many difficulties, with good grades and a good GPA, and many new relationships built, but to be completely honest, I am sufficiently drained. I need God to renew my energy physically, mentally, emotionally, and most importantly, spiritually.

Tonight, after a long phone conversation with a special man, I went outside on my deck. As I sat there beneath a blanket of twinkling stars in the chilly December air, green tea in hand, my thinking turned into praying. I prayed and thought about many things, from school, to people, to myself and my relationship with the Lord. As my mind landed on the last subject, I really began to evaluate myself.

"Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you? Unless indeed you fail to meet the test!"
{2 Corinthians 13:5}

Through this "examination," I began to see how I spent time with God this semester. When I think of spending time with God, I tend to thing of reading the Bible, going to church, and praying. Reading the Bible: check. I love reading my Bible. There is rarely a day that I go without reading at least something in God's Word. I love to read my favorite verses that I have underlined in my Bible, and I love to send verses to friends everyday as a little piece of encouragement to remind them that they're not alone. Going to church: check. I have found an awesome church to attend in Madison, MS called North Ridge. There are lots of college students and young families that I get the joy of worshiping with every Sunday, and I look forward to it every weekend. Prayer: Hmmm...

Prayer is an area I have been struggling with for quite some time now. When it comes to prayer, I am seriously A.D.D. A lot of times this semester, I will try praying before I go to sleep at night. Whenever I try that, I always wake up the next morning realizing I fell asleep mid-prayer. Sometimes I try praying as I'm walking to class. One thing wrong with that is that it takes about 3 minutes to walk anywhere on campus, so that ends up being a pretty short prayer. Either that, or I end up getting distracted or running into a friend and talking to them.

The past year or so I have come to an awareness of my "A.D.D. prayer life". I realize that it is something that needs to change, but every time I try to change it, it seems that I fail. I came to an understanding tonight though, that this does not just need to change, it is going to change. During this break, and at the Passion conference in a couple weeks, and throughout 2012, I am making a commitment to myself and to God to "pray without ceasing".

"Pray without ceasing."
{1 Thessalonians 5:17}

"Continue steadfastly in prayer..."
{Colossians 4:2}

"I desire then that in every place the men should pray..."
{1 Timothy 2:8}

God does not desire half-hearted, lukewarm people who have no desire to talk to Him, simply doing the bare minimum in order to go to heaven. He desires humble children who passionately seek His face through prayer and reading His Word.