Different Prayers, Same Need

Often I encourage you to listen to the song then read, this time I hope you will read then listen. It is almost a 10 minute song but PLEASE find a time and space where you can allow the words to pour over you!

https://youtu.be/SzbToVnO4s4

One of my favorite places to pray is in the shower. I think it is because I know I won’t have any interruptions there. It’s 15 minutes of just me, so I can better focus. When I pray, I also have worship music playing and often I find that my prayers begin to intertwine with the songs. If I am praying for healing, all of a sudden the song will have some lyric about how God is our healer. Or if I am praying for wisdom, I will hear a lyric that says how our wisdom comes from the Lord. It is weird, but awesome. Since this happens often, I will, as I am turning on the music, ask God to give me the song He wants me to pray over my friends and family. Sometimes it happens. Sometimes it doesn’t. As I stepped in today and had all my friends and family on my heart and mind, I asked God to give me a song that I could pray over everyone. My heart was heavy with all that is going on in all of their lives and I didn’t feel like I had the words to pray. No sooner than I had finished the prayer did the first note of the next song play and I knew. I knew He had fully and completely answered my prayer.

The song happened to be a song that may be the most impactful song of my life, from possibly the most impactful album of my life (and if you know me well and how much I love worship music you know that is saying a LOT). The song is “Still Believe” by Kim Walker-Smith from the album “Still Believe”. It is filled to overflowing with the power of the Holy Spirit. God used it in my life at a time where I was in very poor health, in lots of pain, and just beginning to find out that my son has special needs. I was drowning. And I had no words to pray. I locked myself in a closet and listened to this album, having never heard it before, and with every song, she began to sing over me the words that were inside me, that I had silently prayed with tears and groans, but didn’t know how to fully express. It was a miraculous moment and it brought me back into the light. The song “Still Believe”, especially, was a big part of my awakening. That is why as soon as I heard the first note, I knew it was the song I was to use to pray. The thing is, there is so much about this song that I would love to dissect and give insight to, but on this day God struck my heart the most with one section in particularly. The prayers of my friends and family are all over the map. Every area that you could think of that a person may need prayer in, is likely a prayer for one of those I love. However, the need we all have is the same no matter what the prayer request may be. More of Jesus. Just like this song sings. Specifically, more of His presence. In a spontaneous section of the song, she begins to sing a prayer over everyone that is at the live concert, but I also believe she was thinking of those that would listen to this album later. As she begins this prayer, she says “In your presence God it has no place” and then continues by listing things that have no place. Pain. Disease. Sickness. Weariness. Depression. Then she says again “In Your Presence God, In Your Presence Jesus, we find all we need, we find all we need", and it was there that God struck me in the heart with the prayer that I need, that my friends need, that my family needs, that we all need. More of His Presence. What I realized as she continued to sing is the truth that it is in His PRESENCE that all those things and more have no place. It is in His PRESENCE where we find all we need. If I, my friends, my family, or yes, you reading this blog, aren't in His Presence daily then we are missing the very thing we need to answer the prayers that we have. His Presence is what heals pain, disease and sickness. His Presence is what restores strength. His Presence is where joy takes over depression. Yet, it is His Presence that we seem to push aside the most. We allow life to take over and go an entire day or more without one moment with Him. How am I to gain what I need if I am not in the Presence of the Creator of all things? The One who IS love. IS joy. IS peace. IS wisdom. IS understanding. IS hope. And why, since I do find those things when I am in His Presence, do I choose so often not to be with Him? I think I have, and maybe even you have, believed a lie that Satan has so wickedly crafted. That to be in His Presence means to take 2, 3, 4, or more hours. And don't get me wrong, if we have that kind of time to spend with Him, we should jump at the chance, but that isn't what, I believe, He is asking. Not on the daily. The daily is praying and worshiping while in the shower. Taking your lunch break to meet a friend that encourages you in your faith. Turning off the radio on your morning commute and tuning in to Him, through prayer, worship or even silence. His presence is all around, and we are promised to find Him when we seek Him with all our heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)

”Presence” is defined in many ways, one being what I am referring to here, “something (such as a spirit) felt or believed to be present”. In His Presence we believe Him to there as well as feel Him there. But, I believe, another part of the definition is true too. The definition reads, “one that is present (being in view or at hand) such as, the actual person or thing that is present”. When we are in His presence He becomes present. The 15 minutes I spend in the shower attunes me to His presence so when I need Him to be present in my prayer request He is. He is “in view and at hand” to provide me with the right word. Right action. Right reaction. All because I took the time to get all that I need from His presence. No matter our prayer our answer is found in His presence. Life. Love. Joy. Peace. Healing. Hope. All we need is in Him.