Teach us to pray

What did she remember about prayer?  Did someone teach her?  Did someone pray with her?  Janet thought back on her childhood.  Yes, her mom and dad prayed.  They took her to church and Sunday school.  Teachers at church told the children, "Close your eyes and fold your hands...like this...and we'll pray to God."  She remembered peeking around at her classmates and seeing them seriously and dutifully closing their eyes and folding hands.  She heard the Lord's Prayer as a youngster in church and then at school.

Every school day at Roosevelt School in Ridgefield Park, NJ the 'Opening Exercises' promptly began the day.  The teacher or one of the better readers in the class would read verses from the Bible. Since this was during the 1940s, the black leather bound Bible that sat on the teacher's desk was the King James version.  Usually chosen was Psalm 23 or Psalm 100 or even Psalm 1, but the reading was reverent and respectful.  Following the reading everyone in the classroom recited the Lord's Prayer.  No giggling, no excuses...everyone joined in praying.  Then, of course, the class would stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.  A normal day in the life of an elementary school child during the 1940s.

Janet thought about praying the Lord's Prayer.  As a young child she wasn't sure what some of it meant. "Our Father"...that was simple enough.  She understood at an early age that God the Father was a God of love.  And of course, since her own father, Daddy, loved her intensely, she could identify with that.
The next phrase always baffled her.  The version she learned as a child was, "which art in Heaven". As a child she always wondered why that phrase wasn't more personal with a 'who' instead of the word 'which'.  "Hallowed be Thy name" was understandable even though 'hallowed' was a difficult word for a young child to spell.  "The kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven" was a phrase she always loved because it made her think of Heaven as a glorious, happy place.  "Give us this day our daily bread" made her thankful she would never be hungry.  "And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors"...she remembered how confused that phrase meant to a young girl in the Presbyterian church.  After all, what were debts and debtors?  Then when her parents decided to attend the Methodist church, the wording changed to trespasses and trespass.  That was even harder to say! "And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil" gave her protective comfort.  Then, how she loved the closing phrases..."For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.  Amen".

As an adult she had sung Albert Hay Malotte's musical arrangement of The Lord's Prayer hundreds of times for weddings, funerals and special events.  A vocal joy to sing those words, understand those words and communicate those loving words that Jesus spoke to teach His disciples how to pray.  A special privilege to sing!

Oh how her knowledge of prayer had grown over the years.  She had recently discovered the intimacy one gains with Jesus when in prayer.  By opening her heart, pouring our her struggles, her uncertainties, her fears, her confessions but also her praises and worship to this wonderful magnificent, holy God was a humble experience!  Long ago she had realized prayer isn't a formal collection of proper verbiage but a conversation...simple, direct and open.

Yes, and since the cancer, she fully realized how powerful prayer really is!  When friends, family, acquaintances found out she had the diagnosis of brain cancer, they prayed!  She now knew that God hears every prayer and always answers how He knows best.  We sometimes get upset and even angry at God because he doesn't answer our prayer the way we think is best.  But Janet knew with certainty that God is in control of all things, so prayer is answered in accordance with His plan.  She was reminded again and again that God had chosen to save her from cancer and prolong her life because she still had work to do.  How humble she felt!  How glorious she felt knowing that God was using her for His purposes!

Now she prayed with vigor for friends and family to come closer to God, to surrender to Jesus and be assured of graduation into His heavenly paradise!  Prayer is special, prayer enables us to talk with God and prayer gives us opportunity to listen to Him.  What a blessed conversation!

As Rev. W. M. Clow wrote, "One of the gravest obstacles in the way of believing that God answers prayer is that to do so would be alter His own natural and moral laws, and hence to 'change His mind'. The answer must be along such lines as to ask, 'What is God's mind?' According to Jesus, it is fellowship with man and that forever.  All else subserves that great plan, and prayer, the medium whereby man enters into communion with his God, is surely provided for in the scheme of creation.  Christians do, in fact, experience answer to prayer, whether it be direct or indirect, immediate or deferred; and the final answer to prayer is summed up for us in Jesus' words: 'How much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit.'  Whatever we want, all that we really need is God; and prayer brings us God."