Prayer was easy when it was easy to exist...

I used to have a strong prayer life.

I spent a lot of time in prayer, I lead others in prayer, it was usually my first response to whatever I was faced with. But over the last few years that has dwindled to the point where I rarely will sit down and just pray. I’ll throw up a prayer of thanks when faced with something good, or a call for help when I come across a situation I don’t know how to handle, but that’s pretty much the extent of it. I still desire to draw closer to God, to follow His plan for my life… but I cannot get myself to sit down, just me and God, and talk.
I’ve been struggling for a long time now to figure out how I got to this place, why prayer is such a chore… this weekend I was reading a book by Anne Lamott and I recognized part of my struggle…

I’m overwhelmed.

If I sit down to pray suddenly the troubling things I have to bring before my God becomes more than I can handle… a never ending list of pain and struggle. It seems as though no matter how long I sit in prayer there is always one more person or event that needs God’s attention… situations that I don’t know how to help, how to fix, where prayer is my only defence, so if I don’t pray for them, I’m not doing anything at all.

…………………………..

Over the weekend I saw on the news the family of a Canadian soldier who was killed in Afghanistan. A reserve soldier, not someone who was planning on going into battle. There is only one year until my brother graduates from Royal Military College and gets stationed somewhere and it doesn’t look like Canada is going to be pulling out of Afghanistan anytime soon. I’m afraid.

Friends devote their lives to bringing light to dark places. I need them to be safe.

I went and saw An Inconvenient Truth with Kat and Laura a while ago, the reality of what is happening to our planet is shocking. It left me with the realization that even if we find a way to feed the world and heal them of the curable diseases that cause so many deaths, an incredible amount of people will still die from flood, famine, or other natural disasters unless we can also heal our environment. It seems impossible.

I just graduated University, which means that a lot of my friends are feeling lost and without direction in their lives. First jobs are hard to find, and when they do come along they are often disappointing. Disillusionment abounds.

Sickness, struggle, heartbreak, loss of faith. Tears fall.

……………………………..

In An Inconvenient Truth Al Gore said that it is important that we don’t go from ignorance to despair, that we have to find a place to rest in the middle.

I don’t know how to be in the middle right now.

And so I find myself unable to pray...