What do you do when something is hard? When something that should be easy takes too much effort? When you’ve given it a go, but it seems like no progress has been made? Well, if you’re like most of humanity … you’ll tend to quit. In fact, the J-Curve theory of behavioral change states that when we try to do something like form a new, healthy habit, things will usually get worse before we see the benefit of that change.

And unfortunately, most people tend to quit the new direction soon after the “worse” begins. If we want to see the benefit of the new, we have to bear through the pain that accompanies it - not something most of us are particularly good at doing. The same is true for us as we try to grow in our practice of prayer. It is usually harder at first. We often fail more than we succeed in our plans. But in the end (if we DO bear through it), the payoff is a richness of relationship with God that defies description.

#PrayFirst #Persistence #Patience #Piety #Fasting

There are so many great things in life that we have good intentions to do, but we often fail to make them a regular part of our lives - why is this? In short, because we are ALL human. Our bodies aren't perfect. Our minds aren't perfect. Our world isn’t perfect. And all our imperfections colliding with all the imperfections of others stewing in the cauldron of the world's imperfections means that good intentions are not enough.

We've spent a couple of weeks digging into the nature of prayer on Sunday mornings, but this week we'll push into what it means to move beyond merely recognizing the merits of prayer or simply wanting to pray more. We'll discover that intention must meet action if we ever want to really live a PRAY FIRST kind of life. .

#PrayFirst #Plan #Place #Practice

Many of us often approach prayer as carefully-curated, randomly-collected, or desperately-uttered words spoken into the void in the hope that they might somehow affect the REAL world, though they be nothing more than ritual in practice to us. But this is not the truth, the reality, the essence of prayer. Prayer is not empty phrases bandied to the darkness. Prayer is not feeble liturgy badly remembered. Prayer is not about vainly hoping that I just get what I want because I want it so desperately, not really believing that it will make a difference in the end. In fact, it is SO much more! Prayer has a purpose. Prayer has power. And prayer is with and through and for and by and in and about and to and from the most beautiful, glorious, dynamic person in the cosmos.

#PrayFirst #Purpose #Person #Power

Who is the most important person in your life? Often, we respond with the name of a spouses, a parent, a sibling, or a friend. These are people who we know and and who know us. These are those who add value to our lives and with whom we share deep connection & relationship. Now imagine that you never, ever spoke to them - you didn't call or write or message. In fact, imagine you went over to their house, looked through their photo albums and drank their coffee, but didn't talk to them. Imagine further that you sat and stared at them, read their autobiography in front of them, and even engaged in conversation with others in the house about them, but actually failed to speak to them as they tried to engage you in conversation.

Pretty awkward and weird, right? And yet this is often how we approach conversing with God. We'll talk about Him, attend regular gatherings at His house, even talk to others ABOUT Him, yet fail to enter the conversation He is desperately trying to have with us - we're talking about prayer. We've mystified it, complicated it, sacramentalized it, and even feared it. But - while it IS a most holy endeavor - it was never intended to be any of this. Prayer may be something that has little / no place in your life, it might be something that is a regular part of your everyday life, or it might be something in between - regardless, this will be a time to breathe fresh life into what prayer is for you!

#PrayFirst #Perspective #Position #Priority