Breathe, Believe, Pray

James 5:13-20

“Are you hurting?  Pray.  Do you feel great?  Sing.  Are you sick?  Call the church leaders together to pray...” James 5:13 (MSG)

Very simple instructions, yet hard to remember and follow without having complete faith in God.  Incredibly difficult to follow or even know without knowing God at all.

Other than a simple prayer of, “God, help me,” praying wasn’t the first thing to which I ran when I was hurting.  My tendency was to stay stuck in self-pity, focusing on all the reasons things would never get better and not believing God would help me because I wasn’t worth it.

I’ve never had trouble singing when I feel great, but I struggled with reaching out for healing prayer.  In the last few months before going into treatment, I did go for prayer after communion the few times I made it to church.  But that was the extent of my reaching out to the church.

I’ve been prone to believing in the power of prayer – when others pray or when I pray for others.  I didn’t think there was much power in praying for myself.  Of course, how could there be if I didn’t really believe?

Yet!  “Believing-prayer will heal you, and Jesus will put you on your feet.  And if you’ve sinned, you’ll be forgiven – healed inside and out.”  James 5:15 (MSG)

The power of belief extends to the power of prayer.

In today’s society of consumerism, importance of appearance, popularity contests, political strife, etc, it is difficult to turn my eyes away from the world and focus solely on God.  I know to do so keeps my heart at peace and my worries decrease.  But, though I know he’s there, I can’t see him.  What I can see are my troubles, my bills, my state of unemployment in a bad economy...  Though I can hear him, the voice of the world is louder through friends and family, the news, etc.  I have to stop, listen and pay attention to hear him.  All the other voices are ready and available without any effort on my part at all.

In order to get to the place where I can turn away from the world and latch onto believing prayer, I must exercise.  I must hit the spiritual gym at least twice a day, morning and night.  And I must do little exercises throughout the day, always reminding myself, “Breathe.  Give it to God.”

So as I head to the unemployment office in a little bit to find out why my claim isn’t going through, I will not be anxious, worried or upset.  I will breathe, and I will give it to God.

Amen! :D