#shorts Part 22 — When We Put God on Mute

Lord, you speak, but we are deaf.
You call, but we do not want to listen.

David Clowes, Let Us Pray: 120 Prayers for all Occasions, Prayer #50, Pages 52-53

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Hello Readers, hope all’s well. Time for another #shorts post.

And today’s post will truly live up to that label of “#shorts.” Sometimes that’s how it is, and that’s okay. Today’s #shorts post is a prayer. It comes from a book of prayers called Let Us Pray: 120 Prayers for all Occasions, by David Clowes.

Let Us Pray is a book of 120 short and quick prayers. David Clowes is a long-serving Methodist minister, and the prayers in his book come from his experience. I found this book when I was helping my parents clear out some of the clutter in their house. I found it in a pile of stuff and thought, “hey, that looks pretty useful.”

Now I know finding the book was another one of God’s little gifts that He’s always giving. I enjoy reading my one prayer a day from this book, which is usually one of the last things I do for the day. So this book has become part of my nighttime routine.

Anyway, enough about that. Let’s get on to the actual prayer. This prayer, #50 in the book, is about when God speaks to us, but we are deaf to Him.

Deaf by Choice

Looking back on my life, in hindsight I can see some important times in my life when God was trying to get through to me. Significant times, when God was trying to warn me and help me. But I couldn’t hear Him, because I didn’t want to hear Him. Thankfully for me, God was with me the whole time, and looking out for me even when I didn’t care about Him.

And then came the time when I was Born Again. Now I had made a public declaration of my Faith, and devoted my life to following Jesus. So now I would never again shut out the LORD, right??

Wrong. Even after being Born Again (and I’m still a fairly new Christian, immature in my Walk), there are still times when I try to handle my problems on my own. There are still situations that I don’t take to the LORD for consultation with Him. There are still areas where my pride and stubborn stiff-necked attitude on certain things makes me follow my own will rather than listen for the LORD’s.

It’s a bad habit of mine, one I hope will get better over time. I know the LORD is patient with us, and he changes all His children gradually, from the inside. But the changes happen over a long period of time. For now I try to be aware of when I’m committing the sin of shutting out the LORD, but sometimes I fall into it by habit alone.

The biggest problem is when I don’t take things to the LORD for consultation with his wisdom. Many of us are guilty of this, and we have different motivations behind it. As for myself I can say often times I choose not to take things to the LORD for His input because of a mistaken attitude that I shouldn’t bother Him with “the small things.” But an infinite God who is Omnipotent and Eternal can never be annoyed or frustrated with “the small things.” This is something I know on an intellectual level, but when problems arise I often fall back onto an instinctual level. We all do this, to some extent.

If you know what I mean by any of this, you’ll enjoy today’s prayer. You can also pray it for yourself, and I pray you will get something out of it. This is prayer #50 from Let Us Pray, and it’s entitled “When We Are Deaf.”

When We Are Deaf

Lord, you speak, but we are deaf.

You call, but we do not want to listen.

You challenge us, but we close our ears.

You hold out your hand to guide and to lift us, but we turn away from you.

You reach out to give us your comfort, but we are too self-confident to receive it.

You join us on our journey, but we do not recognize you.

You try to change the direction of our lives, but we think that we know best.

You warm our cold hearts, you inspire our faith, and you forgive us again and again, and we are amazed.

Lord, open our hearts to your grace and renew our hope and faith in Christ our Lord. Amen.

David Clowes, Let Us Pray: 120 Prayers for all Occasions, Prayer #50, Pages 52-53

“You call, but we do not want to listen.” “You join us on our journey, but we do not recognize you.” For me, these are the key lines in his prayer. There are times when I don’t take my problems to God, and don’t ask Him for consultation about choices I can make. Times when I don’t ask for His wisdom. Even worse, there are times when I do hear Him saying something, but I don’t want to hear it because that’s not what I want to do. This is self-sufficiency.

Self-sufficiency, which means relying on ourselves rather than God, is a sin. But it’s also a bad habit, and for many of us it’s an instinct. It takes time and dedicated effort to overcome and rewrite our instinctual habits that have been deeply reinforced over many years.

We can’t expect instant results in defeating the sin of self-sufficiency. But if we become aware of our bad habit, we can REPENT!! Of it to the LORD, and ask for His help in defeating it. As for what we can do, we can pay attention so we recognize when we’re doing things on our own instead of following the LORD. And if we pray this prayer from Let Us Pray by David Clowes, that will help too.

If you enjoyed this prayer I introduced today, I suggest you try to find a copy of let us pray. Most of the other prayers in the book are like this. If you enjoyed today’s prayer and found it beneficial, you’ll like the other 119 prayers too.

That’s it for #shorts #22. Stay tuned for more #shorts all this month.

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Until next time, be strong and do good!

Your new best friend in Christ,

99:9

<<<EXALT THE LORD OUR GOD AND WORSHIP AT HIS HOLY HILL; FOR THE LORD OUR GOD IS HOLY>>>

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