…. and then the tire just popped but I guess you knew that. Ok bless my wife, my pencil to write well because my balance sheet just isn’t adding up; why does the color caesious exist God?; Hey I need more money, a boat to show off to my neighbors, I pray for my son who has this bump near his eyebrow; I need some new workout gear to feel good & look good in the gym; I hate my job so winning the lottery would be nice. I pray a hedge of protection around….
“And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him”. — Matthew 6:7-8
Jesus is telling me that when I pray, my goal is not to see how long I can keep my mouth moving or how much I can say. In, fact, Jesus commands me “not to use meaningless repetitions”. The idea is not that I should never repeat myself but rather that the repetition should not be “meaningless”. In other words, I shouldn’t just say things to God as a prayer with no rhyme or reason to say things that others will hear as though I’m praying to impress them.
I’m not to babble “as the pagan’s would” repeating themselves often to see if they could annoy the gods they worshipped and get the gods to give them what they wanted so they would hush. As a parent of four children, I can see why someone might think that would work. We should be extremely careful in all our prayers to mean what we say; and to say only what we mean from our hearts. The very best prayers are but vain repetitions if they are not the language of the heart.
I think it’s the same when communicating by social media or email.
You see, when you write a long email, your chances of being read, understood, and remembered are much lower. People are receiving far more junk email these days than ever before so it’s important that you be as concise as possible. Longer messages hit the trash can without ever making an impact.
I see posts on FB, Twitter, etc that are meaningless and all about themselves. A recent study showed that 40% of all tweets are “pointless babble”. Your audience is busy. Stand out from the other hundreds of posts that they’ve received today by deleting most of what you’ve written. A shorter message stands out.
Question |
How can you pray more from the heart?
To the point.