A Powerful PrayerSample

Prayer is like swimming.

Hierocles, a 5th-century philosopher from Alexandria, collected humorous stories into a book to teach those who read it. One of the stories in the book is about a man who made a ridiculous vow that he would never go into the water until he had learned to swim! Of course, he's not getting anywhere!

It is equally foolish to think that we must be able to speak beautifully and fluently in front of other people before we can pray. We can only learn how to pray in public if we are willing to start - even if it means that our words will falter at our first attempt.

A prayer, after all, is a conversation with God and heaven.

Reflection:

None will immediately be fluent in prayer. The Lord does not see the beautiful words we say but our hearts when we pray. What is our prayer attitude? Do we prioritize focusing our hearts on God or using beautiful words in prayer?

Let us learn to put our hearts first in prayer.

In prayer, it is better to have a heart without words than words without a heart.

(John Bunyan)