Giving Voice to Your Prayers

I don’t consider myself much of a “prayer practitioner” when it comes to praying the Psalms. In fact, I put off writing this theme introduction for weeks because I kept thinking, Uh-oh, what am I going to say? I’m really not very good at praying the Psalms. People are going to figure that out!

Granted, I often turn to a psalm during corporate prayer times because the Psalms help me pray more than just, “God, You are really great and awesome, and . . . um . . . big. Amen.” In those times when my words are inadequate to express my heart toward the Lord, the Psalms give me a language of praise. But I discounted the impact the Psalms have had on my prayer life—until I started paging through my Bible.

I discovered that, over the course of many years, the Lord has used the Psalms to minister to me during several key seasons in my life. I noted ways I had voiced a psalm to call out in times of pain or uncertainty. I recalled with surprise and gratitude the various psalms friends had used to pray for me—with the dates and some of the circumstances surrounding why they prayed that way.

One particular psalm was underlined—almost every verse—and my handwriting scribbled all over margins. In a season of my ministry life when I felt betrayed by others, I clung to Psalm 37 for weeks. I found myself making the words of David my own. I pleaded with God—just as David had—that He might deliver me from the pain caused by others and restore those things that seemed taken from me.

Now, looking back at the psalm several years later, I rejoice to see the ways God restored things in my life abundantly beyond what I could have imagined at that time. I suspect David felt the same way years after he prayed and penned that psalm.

As I continued paging through my Bible, I recalled a night when I found myself praying through all of Psalm 119—yes, the entire, lengthy psalm—alone in my hotel room while on a trip as a member of a pastoral search team. My heart was terribly conflicted that night and I could not sleep. I remember feeling a peace when I was finally finished—and I knew what the Lord was asking me to do.

God also brought to mind the verses (Ps. 139:17–18) that Evelyn Christiansen (a national prayer leader) used when she prayed over me just a month before she died. I wrote in the margin that when she finished praying for me, she patted my shoulder and said, “There! You’re ready to go.” She took care to remind me how precious God’s thoughts are, and that when I wake up in the morning, God is still with me.

Embracing the Psalms

In this issue, authors who are prayer practitioners of this “Book of Prayers” pass long helpful ways to embrace the Psalms. Ben Patterson points out that if Jesus thought the Psalms were important enough to include in His own prayer life, so should we! Tricia Rhodes distinguishes among the various kinds of psalms, noting that some fit times of joy while others fit times of pain or uncertainty. And you will be encouraged by ideas from members of America’s National Prayer Committee as John Maempa compiles their best practices of praying the Psalms.

I’m not as much of a practitioner of praying the Psalms as I would like to be, but I am convinced it is truly “God’s Prayer Book.” I just needed the reminder.

–CAROL MADISON is editor of Prayer Connect.