A New Way to Pray

“And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” -Matthew 6:27

“Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name. Worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness.” -Psalm 29:2

We sure do pray a lot about the things we’re worried about, don’t we? “God, I don’t know if I’m ready for this test, please help me.” Or, “I’m really nervous about my mom’s health, Lord, make her better.” Sure, it isn’t bad to ask for help, but let tell you of a better way. Jesus says, “Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself.” (Matthew 6:34a) When you look at leaders in the bible, you don’t see them praying like the prayers above. When many people in the bible are met with trouble, they begin to “ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name.” In other words, they begin to worship God by telling him about his character and how great he is. For example, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were faced with being thrown into a fiery furnace because they would not worship the king. The first thing they had to say before being thrown in was this: “Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.” (Daniel 6:17) They did go on about their worry (and they certainly had reason to!). They declared that their God was a deliverer.

What I am trying to say from this is that we need to stop focusing so much on our worries and focus more on who God is. Our Great I AM is so incredible, so matchless, that when we ascribe to him the glory due his name we realize that we don’t even need to worry because of who God is! No, life does not always go the way we want it to, but if God is our foundation, then everything will be okay in the end. In Matthew 7:24-27, Jesus tells a parable of two men. One man builds the foundation of his house on sand, and the other builds the foundation of his house on rock. A terrible storm comes to the two houses and the one with the sandy foundation fall down in the storm, but the one with the solid foundation stands firm. Notice that both houses still have a storm blowing over them! Even though we are guaranteed to have awful things come our way in life, we have a Great I AM that holds us together in those times because of who he is.

So I encourage you, brothers and sisters, do not worry. Instead, ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name! Shalom!