Most of the time I love praying for a patient. Sometimes holding their hand. Sometimes with my arm around the shoulder of their anxious loved ones. I love stepping with them into the realization that we are on holy ground. As I personalize their petitions, I remember how healing it is to be prayed for by name. But at the end of a day like today, on the 100th prayer, I peevishly pictured God saying "You again? Take a break girl!"
The following comes from Eugene Peterson's Living-Message- It reminds me that every prayer, no matter how brief, is heard and valued. A reminder I needed!
"One of the indignities to which pastors are routinely subjected is to be approached, as a group of people are gathering for a meeting or a meal with the request, "Reverend, get things started for us with a little prayer, will ya?" It would be wonderful if we would counter by bellowing William McNamara's fantasized response: "I will not! There are no little prayers! Prayer enters the lion's den, brings us before the holy where it is uncertain whether we will come back alive or sane, for 'it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God.'"
Hear my cry for mercy as I call to you for help, as I lift up my hands toward your Most Holy Place. Psalms 28:2
See if I ask for "a little prayer" over a meal or whatever again! Good food for thought.
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