In April of 2006 my church dedicated a week to 24/7 prayer. As the week came to an end the church bulletin published a prayer I anonymously entered into the blog as I took on a 4am prayer time. (I was surprised to get to church and have some who know me better know instantly it was me who wrote it!) Here is some of my prayer:

My King, my Lord, my Papa. As I sit here now, tonight, as it is dark and rainy outside I try to remember how much darker it was before I knew you. I always knew you were there, even before I had been told about you – remember how I used to cry in my hidden closet when the darkness became too much to bear as a small child?

Faith is not the easy way. How many times in our pain have we, as Christians been tempted to turn our backs? It is such a human thing to do. When we perceive your better judgment as broken promises we want to turn from you. Even though I know that giving up my faith would be as easy as stopping breathing, there are days when I want to threaten to leave so that you would stop me and beg me not to go, proving I am still loved.

But for those who only see broken promises, who see you as a vengeful and vicious god, I pray Father, that you would grant us gentle hands and understanding so that we might help show the way back.

So often we seek to fix brokenness. Sometimes we just need to start with the patience of Job’s friends who sat in silence with him for days. How often do we just need a place to come to lay our hearts down and know that we are loved enough to just have silent support? How often does emotion overtake any words until there is just silent brokenness? Sometimes we need to simply sit silently at the foot of the cross with those who are broken and those who are lost…