how to pray 24-7-365.

22 Jul 2011 1 Comment

by adoptedandunsettled in Uncategorized

Hello long-lost friends and readers!  Sorry for my brief hiatus from the blogging world.  I’ve been laying by the pool and on the beach and longboarding and enjoying the HEAT (very thankful for air conditioning at night, though).  Also, it has been really hard to keep up with Portrait of my Summer because it turns out that both my computer and wordpress are very finicky.  If you are considering starting a blog, I would advise against using wordpress because sometimes it just decides that it doesn’t want to do what you want it to do.

Anywhoooooo, this was the last week of 6 weeks of unbroken prayer.  There is a journal in the prayer room that people can write in, and this past week I found a list of instructions that some unknown pray-er added.  It was entitled How to Pray 24-7-265.  I really liked it so I thought I’d share it to you (none of this is my own writing).  Hopefully this will make up for my absence in your life.

How to Pray 24-7-365

- find some friends
- start praying
- start eating together
- start dreaming about the kingdom of God
- look at your time and how you spend it
- Jesus said, “Abide in me.”
- pray for your friends.  pray for more friends.
- “for the glory of my name.”  remember that.
- listen to what He’s telling you.  The next thing you’re reasonably certain Jesus wants you to do, do it within 10 seconds.  Practice listening.  Practice obeying.
- throw great parties
- ask God for bigger dreams–stuff that you could never do on your own
- “Abide in me.” Remember.
- rest in Him
- tell Him you trust Him

(this part of the list filled a page of the journal and then the next page was blank except for this at the top…)

Leave a blank page for the Holy Spirit to fill.

(the next page was blank except for this…)

He’ll probably need another.

(continued on a 4th page…)

- turn up the music really loud and worship with all your guts
- try to impractical and irresponsible with your time, giving to others as you intercede; as you get to the meeting early to set up chairs; as you scrape the gum off the bottom of the table; as you bring cookies to your annoying neighbor
- start praying on your commute and in the shower
- find more friends to pray with
- get promiscuous with your money.  Be obedient to where God tells you to sew it.
- create something beautiful in your garden, on your laptop, on your guitar, or on your camera.  Thanks God for being the author of life.
- have another dinner party
- write down prayer requests for others on your phone.  Pray while you’re at the dentist.
- “Abide in me.”
- ask some friends to dream about what abiding in Him together looks like.  Listen.  Obey.
- start to get wise through the Holy Spirit on how to abide together over weekends and holidays
- remind each other that you are God’s beloved simply because you are his daughter or son
- that God that this relationship is becoming natural.  ”It’s just what we do together.”
- tell stories of how awesome God is.  We shall overcome by the blood of the lamb and the word of our testimony.
- being someone to the prayer room and spend some time with Papa.  Remind them that Paul wrote “Follow me as I follow Christ.”
- tell Him “I trust you.”
- adopt some more friends into your heart.  Serve their best interests.
- learn about another part of the world, like the Nubians in Africa.  Pray that they would have Jesus dreams.
- use the brain that God gave you to get strategic about 24-7-365
- eat something really fine with your friends.  Taste and see that God is good.
- “Abide in me.”
- let this become with no hype simply what we do.  Simply who we are.  A group of friends abiding in the vine.