Two Types of Prayers

Someone once told me there are two types of prayers. “Help me, help me, help me.” and “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” I pray the former quite a lot and then have to remind myself to pray the latter after my issue is resolved.

I think some of us have a hard time praying the help me part. In America we are taught to be independent, pull ourselves up by the bootstraps, you can do anything if you just work hard enough, you can be the President of the United States of America. I’m not sure how many of us are taught at home and in our religious houses to surrender our wills to God.

I have learned over the years to pray for help. That requires that I come to the point where I admit I can’t do it all by myself and I need help! It used to take a lot of pain to get me to that point. Fortunately, I recognize the signs earlier and ask for help a lot quicker these days, bypassing a ton of trouble.

What I’m practicing now is asking for help in a different way. I used to ask God for help, and then tell God exactly how to help me. Can you imagine the arrogance? I used to pray for a specific outcome!

Now I’m still asking for help, but these days I mean the willingness to  accept whatever God has in store for me. I found that when I stopped praying for specific outcomes and started praying for resolutions, God’s solution was so much more elegant than my own!

The next time you are in a bad situation, ask God for help. And that’s all. Just help, whatever that looks like. See what happens (also, have the patience to wait for the resolution, God’s time is not what our time is). Take note of the outcome. Set it as a precedent and remember it the next time you have a problem.