When is prayer bad...

Yesterday I found a time that prayer did not work for me. I was in a group of men praying for the upcoming service and right in the middle of the prayer time I realized that the prayer being said, while well intentioned and perfectly valid were taking me totally away from the mindset God had given me to preach that morning. I was so distracted that I finally got up and left the prayer time so I could regroup my thoughts and regain my focus for the service. It made me think. Is there a time when prayer is not useful? Yes, I believe there is and here are a couple of the conditions.
First, prayer could be harmful when it is time to act. I think of the time when Joshua walked around the walls of Jerihco. On the seventh day God said that the time for prayer was over. It was time to shout. A time to act or in this case time for Him to act. Another time prayer can be trouble is when we pray presumptive prayers. This is when we create preconceived notions about what the answer needs to be inject our results as they are mandatory for God to follow. It always amazes me how some people only pray their solution during prayer time. Help John realize how wrong he is or let Liz get out of that relationship because he is no good for her. Presumptive prayers are popular. I just wonder just how biblical they are.
Just a thought...
Chris

The Truth

Went to the Truth project training this weekend. While the truth lessons we learned at the conference were good, they were hard pressed to compare with the life lessons we learned from the hotel stay Friday night. Here are a couple of truths I learned. First, don't believe all the reviews you read on the internet. The two and a half star hotel did not shine as bright in real life as it did online. Next, the truth of real world is everywhere. I could tell because one of our staff received an arbitrary call in the middle of the night from a call girl. What a stark contrast from singing Holy, Holy, Holy as we did at the end of each session at the conference. The last lesson was the greatest and best of all. It is always great to spend time with people who you care about. The location does not seem to matter when you are with good friends.
Thanks guys for laughs and the fun.
Chris

Hang On...

I almost fell off a roof when I was younger trying to retrieve a ball that had been hit up there during a game. To get down, I had to hang on to the edge of the roof and stretch my foot over to a porch three stories up. I don't know why, but the distance I had to stretch to get up to the roof seemed shorter than the one coming down. The problem was simple. Same roof, same porch, different perspectives. Looking down is always scarier than looking up. It is always that way when we are facing trouble with our relationships. What seemed like a small stretch coming up in our relationships has now become a near death experience looking back. How did we get here? What went wrong? He does this... She does that... These are all views from the top looking down to what is usually unsure footing.
The simple truth is this. As we go through the life of a relationship it will always take looking forward and not looking back. Keeping that upward focus enables you to have sure footing even when you are in way over your head. Just as I managed to get down off the roof, you will be able to survive your issues as long as you hand on and keep looking up...
just a thought...
Chris