I have given a lot of thought to prayer during the past days, trying to understand what motivates me to pray. I have heard it said that prayer is conversation with God. If that is true, then when we pray, we need to embrace silence and give God a chance to speak. How does God speak to us? It can be through the Scriptures which we call the Word of God.

All of us have probably heard of the death of Sister Jean, the chaplain of the Loyola basketball team, who died at the age of 106. When asked about her prayer life, she indicated that she does not read a lot of spiritual books but mediates on the Scripture for the day. She takes her direction from those holy words. I too have found that focusing on Scripture is a good way to pray. Jesus, the Son of God, struggled with many issues as a human. In Scripture it is often indicated that Jesus went off by himself to pray. I have no doubt that he desired to reveal a God of mercy and goodness. By his life he showed us how to live in community with others. When Christians gather together they pray and sing together. They are one in prayer.

God wants us to have a relationship with him. We often might feel that our prayers are meaningless because we do not experience what we want. We want our prayers to be answered by this great and glorious God. It is not that simple. We know that a family might be praying for the recovery of someone who needs renewed health. Another family might be praying in the same way and yet one person recovers and the other person does not. Our prayer life is not one of getting what we want but rather it should be our desire to be in a relationship with God coming to know God more deeply.

In the gospel from Luke, Jesus tells his disciples that they should pray always without becoming weary. Jesus then tells of a woman who has to deal with an unjust judge who does not grant her what she desires. She continues to tell him of her needs and eventually he grants what she needs. She is persistent. She has faith in what she is doing. We too need to have faith in what we are doing when we pray. We can come to realize that we cannot control the power of God. God is love and mercy. We need to change our minds to always recognize that no matter the outcome of our prayers, God will always walk with us through our trials and tribulations. That attitude deepens our relationship with God. That is faith. Our pray life helps us come to know the love of God more deeply.

– Helen Ackermann