Prayer, Give God Room

As I shared with you a few weeks ago, my word for 2016 is, “PRAY.”
Prayer must never become just a show for the people around us. It must be so much more than simply just going through the motions to make ourselves appear spiritual.
Prayer was always meant to be the vehicle to give us a genuine connection with God. Most problems with prayer come not because of our outright deliberate disobedience. A weak intercessional experience can be blamed on the simple fact that our hearts are not in the right place.
It is hard to be devoted to prayer if your soul doesn’t yearn for the Lord. If you don’t hunger to be with God then fasting from the banquet of supplication can be quite easy.
It is hard to be committed to communication if you have nobody important enough to talk to. My goal is to be with Jesus and so I need prayer as the way to get to see my affection and relationship grow.
Just as I long to see my romance with my wife to stay positive and passionate; I will cultivate conversation as the key to not losing touch between us.
 Prayer will never get tossed to the wayside as long as we Christians keep our eyes fixed on the Lord.   
Prayer is such an easy practice to abuse. We forget that it was a gift given to us so that God wouldn’t seem distant from us. But prayer has a way of making the temptation to perform and pontificate for an audience of earth quite easy.
When you pray in public, do you find yourself choosing your words very carefully because you are talking more to the surrounding saints when you should just be pouring your heart out to the waiting Savior?
Unfortunately when people tend to care more about the lingo they are using rather than the Lord they should be talking to, their prayers die upon their lips and never make it to the throne of God. Remember it is not the flowery language that wins God favor or the amount of words you might be able to pack into a sentence that impresses him but what our Lord looks for more than anything is our hearts being dedicated to seeking him.
Will you give God room to show up in your world? Will you pick a time that you will set aside just so you can be with him? Will you designate a God spot where the two of you will go when you need to be together? If you want to make sure that you have plenty of God stories to tell in 2016, you have to make sure you have a God spot.
What God does with us in our predetermined place always changes our personal course out in the great wide open. Give the Lord a spot in your house and you can guarantee that heaven will make some bold moves in your heart.
If you are battling addiction, give God room. If you are facing a financial black hole, give God room. If your family is falling apart at the seams. Give God room.
If you want faith to flourish in your church, give God room. If you ever want to be standing on “holy ground” then it is time to take off your shoes and stay awhile.
Where will you go to invite God into your mix to battle upon your knees for all that matters most on your feet?
Now I hear this question all the time, “If God knows everything anyway, why pray? And I say that just because your Heavenly Father may know, doesn’t mean you do. God commanded us to pray because he knew that when we do we get a bigger view of how he is at work all around us. In my God spot, I get the confirmation that there are no coincidences when it comes to how God moves in my midst.
I’m thankful God orchestrates our lives indeed the entire flow of human history, to bring about his purposes in the world for his glory. Prayer actually gives us a front row seat to the wonders that occur when we give God room to flex his awesome power.
You will get to observe the Lord’s influence over every moment and when all is said and done and the party is over, you will see his purpose in all. 
Let me close with this amazing story that Pastor Tim Keller shared with his congregation at Redeemer Presbyterian in New York City.
In his book, “Walking With God Through Pain and Suffering,” Keller wrote: “I sometimes ask people at my church in New York City, Redeemer Presbyterian, if they are glad the church exists. They are (thankfully). Then I point out an interesting string of Joseph-like ‘coincidences’ that brought it all about.
“Redeemer exists to a great degree because my wife, Kathy, and I were set to New York City to start this as a new church. Why were we sent? It was because we joined a Presbyterian denomination that encouraged church planting and that sent us out.
“But why did we join a Presbyterian denomination? We joined it because in the very last semester of my last year at seminary, I had two courses under a particular professor who convinced me to adopt the doctrines and beliefs of Presbyterianism. But why was that professor at the seminary at that time? He was there only because, after a long period of waiting, he was finally able to get his visa as a citizen of Great Britain to come and teach in the United States.
“This professor had been hired by my U.S. seminary but had been having a great deal of trouble getting a visa. For various reasons at the time the process was very clogged and there was an enormous backlog of applications.
“What was it that broke through all the red tape so he could get his visa and come in time to teach me that last semester? I was told that his visa process was facilitated because one of the students at our seminary at the time was able to give the school administration an unusually high-level form of help.
“The student was the son of the sitting president of the United States at the time. Why was his father president? It was because the former president, Richard Nixon, had to resign as a result of the Watergate scandal. But why did the Watergate scandal even occur? I understand that it was because a night watchman noticed an unlatched door.
“What if the security guard had not noticed the door? What if he had simply looked in a different direction? In that case, nothing else in that long string of ‘coincidences’ would have ever occurred. And there would be no Redeemer Presbyterian Church in the city.
“Do you think all that happened by accident? I don’t. If that did not all happen by accident, nothing happens by accident. I like to say to people at Redeemer: If you are glad for this church, then even Watergate happened for you. Very seldom do we glimpse even a millionth of the ways that God is working all things together for good for those who love God. But he is…”
Amazing story. As someone who learns from Keller and appreciates his ministry, I am thankful for Watergate. More than that, I’m thankful God orchestrates our lives, indeed the entire flow of human history, to bring about his purposes in the world for his glory. Pick a God spot. Pick a time for God. Give God room. Get ready for a God story.