...daily prayer...

In our daily lives we need to find a quiet place we can easily go to every day in order to move into a deeper life with the Lord.  This is a place we can find solitude immediately.  This is the place where we can recognize the truth about God, the truth about ourselves, and the truth about the world in which we live.  It is also the place we can recognize the truth about Satan, the devil.  Because our life is a journey we need this place in order too recognize where we truly are on this journey.

We need also to find a time each day in our place of solitude where we can know of God’s awesome presence in our life.  but let’s be honest, this is not as easy to do as it sounds.   We get interrupted all the time in our thoughts, in our responsibilities and work and relationships for which we are responsible.  We struggle with unexpected demands and competing message and data we hear and must process.  There is a discernible and real benefit to find some time early in the morning before we begin our day uninterrupted so that we can begin in solitude before God.

We will feel a great pull to give up this time and place.   This will largely be from within and not from outside.  Inner resistance is a real thing, and because of such resistance we will feel that this time of solitude is not making any appreciable difference.   We must develop the habits of meeting with God in this time and place of solitude if we are ever to resist the struggle of giving it up and leaving it behind again.

At the end of the day what matters the most in finding the time and place is that it provides you with a sense of God’s presence.   I din it personally beneficial to silently repeat in my mind and sometimes on my lips the “Jesus Prayer” — Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner.   I also find it helpful and comforting to repeat the Name “Jesus”, inhaling and saying “Jes” — and exhaling and saying “sus” — so that with each breath I am repeating the Name of Jes-us as I inhale and exhale slowly and quietly and deliberately.   Mostly I am silent and thinking this prayer and thinking the Name of Jesus.

Satan will do everything possible to pull you away from this practice because he knows that your faithful adherence and attraction to solitude will bring you closer too the Lord and further away from Satan’s wily agendas.

Today's Prayer

Lord Jesus Christ, help me find a place of solitude in my life so that I may come before you each day to know of Your love and presence in my life.

You know how easily I am distracted and negligent of You because of all my difficulties and anxieties and shortcomings.  I need Your grace to help me to come each day early in my day to experience quiet time with You.  Help to experience who You truly are, and the truth about You and about me and others.  Sustain me in living a life of quiet presence before You.  Amen.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner.

From the Bible:

“But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you”

Matthew 6:6.

“In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God” Luke 6:12.

“Jesus said to His disciples, ‘Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while’” Mark 6:31.

“Rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed” Mark 1:35.