From our series - Thirty Days of Thanksgiving
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'Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving"
Colossians
4.2
Continue and watch; Those two things are crucial elements in
our prayer lives. Jesus taught us to lead off prayer with praise, “hallowed be
thy name,” and to end our prayer with praise, “for thine is the kingdom and the
power and the glory, forever, Amen.”
I believe meaningful prayer should include thanksgiving from
the start. It’s much better to begin this way rather than to jump in with our
Santa list and just start asking for this, that and the other. “God, I want…
God, I need.”
That reminds me of a Dad and husband who had to spend hours
at a time away from home travelling because of his career. He loved his family
and would bring gifts home to his children each time he would return. They were
always so happy to see their Dad when he’d come home.
Once, he came home, thinking how much he missed being home
and how glad he would be to see their faces. This one time, however, he didn’t
even think to stop by and pick up gifts for his kids. As he walked through the
door, his children went running to him. “Daddy, Daddy, what did you bring us
this time? Where are our presents.”
Their Dad answered them, “I have no gifts for you this time.”
As their faces sank, he continued, “Kids, is it not enough just to see and be
with me? Must I always bring things to you to make you happy?”
I think sometimes that we are much like those children. Is it not enough for us just to be in the presence of our Lord? Are we only happy
with him when he brings us gifts? Is it right that we fill our prayers with
nothing but requests?
Don’t misunderstand; God our Father delights to hear us express
our needs and hear our requests, but prayer is so much more than that. Prayer
should be our response to God’s love by loving him back. “We love him because he first loved us.”(1 John 4.19)
Now, when we do make our petitions before God, asking him for
the things we need or desire, this also should be accompanied with
Thanksgiving.
This is the anticipation of what God is going to do in resolution
to our requests. We may not yet have seen the answers to our prayers but we
know what he does will be best – better than anything we could ever imagine. Paul
asked to be healed, but God knew he would become exalted too highly without
this affliction in his life. Instead God gave him special grace for his trials.
(See 2 Corinthians 12.7-9; also, Ephesians 3.20)
Jesus told the Father “I thank you that you have heard me”
before he raised Lazarus. He knew the Father would hear him and thanked him.
Though Jesus knew what the results of his prayer would be, we don’t always know how God will answer. We should always thank God in
conjunction with the requests we make with him.
Ask God for what you need and thank him for what He's done and what He’s going
to do.
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