The Prayer I Kept Avoiding Because I Knew What God Might Ask Me To Do

I knew I needed to make a phone call.

The number had been sitting in my contacts for days. Nothing catastrophic had happened, nobody was threatening anybody, and there wasn't some enormous family feud worthy of its own television series. I'd simply handled something badly, knew I'd handled it badly, and didn't particularly want to hear myself admit it out loud.

So naturally I prayed about other things.

Quite a few things, actually.

I prayed for my family. I prayed about work. I prayed for somebody who was having a difficult time. I thanked God for several things and probably found another legitimate request or two hiding somewhere in my head.

Very productive prayer.

Except for the phone call.

I knew what was happening too. That's what made it worse.

There are times when we don't know what God wants us to do. I've experienced plenty of those. This wasn't one of them.

I knew.

I just didn't want to do it.

There Are Prayers That Feel A Little Dangerous

“God, show me where I'm wrong.”

That's a dangerous prayer for me.

Not dangerous because God is waiting to humiliate me. Dangerous because I have an impressive ability to explain myself to myself.

Give me enough time and I can produce a fairly convincing argument for almost anything I've already decided to do.

I had good reasons for being frustrated.

I still think some of them were good reasons.

That's part of what made the situation irritating. If I'd been completely wrong, this would've been easier. I could apologize, clean it up, move along.

Instead, I thought I was mostly right and still hadn't behaved particularly well.

Those situations get complicated.

You can be right about the issue and wrong about how you handled the person.

I've needed God to show me that more than once.

I Finally Stopped Praying Around It

A few days into my avoidance, I brought it up.

Not because I became unusually spiritual that morning.

I was simply tired of knowing I was avoiding it.

“Father, I don't want to make this call.”

That was honest.

Then I started explaining why.

I probably spent several minutes giving God information He already possessed, including a detailed account of what the other person had done. There's something slightly ridiculous about presenting your case to Someone who witnessed the entire event.

Still, I did it.

Eventually I got around to my part.

That took longer.

I had been impatient. My tone had been wrong. I'd said something that wasn't necessary, even though I could technically defend the statement itself.

That word technically has protected a lot of nonsense in my life.

Technically true.

Technically allowed.

Technically not my responsibility.

You can hide behind technically for quite a while.

David Prayed Something I Don't Always Enjoy Praying

Near the end of Psalm 139, David says, “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts.”

That's a beautiful verse until you actually pray it.

Then it gets personal.

Search me.

Not the person who irritated me.

Not my spouse.

Not my children.

Not the person at work who clearly needs several hours of divine correction.

Me.

I've prayed that verse and immediately thought of somebody else's problem.

Apparently my mind likes subcontracting conviction.

I have to bring it back.

“No. Me.”

What am I doing?

What am I refusing to see?

What am I defending because admitting it would cost me something?

Sometimes nothing comes to mind.

Other times something comes immediately, which is inconvenient.

One Time It Was Money

I had been praying about finances and asking God for wisdom.

A very respectable Christian prayer.

Wisdom.

Stewardship.

Provision.

All good words.

Meanwhile there was an expense I knew I needed to deal with differently.

I kept hoping wisdom would arrive in a form that didn't require changing the thing I already enjoyed spending money on.

Funny how that works.

I wanted God to improve the numbers while leaving my preferences untouched.

Eventually the obvious became... obvious.

Spend less there.

I didn't need a financial prophet.

I needed to stop buying something as often.

I'm deliberately not telling you what it was because somebody will inevitably decide the item itself is the lesson.

It wasn't.

The uncomfortable part was asking God for wisdom while quietly excluding one category from His answer.

I've done the same thing outside money.

“God, what should I do?”

Anything except that.

“Please guide me.”

Preferably over here.

“Show me.”

But not too much.

That isn't always what I'm doing when I pray, obviously.

Sometimes I genuinely don't know.

But sometimes I know more than I'm admitting.

I Think We Can Use Prayer To Delay Obedience

That's a strange sentence for someone who encourages people to pray.

I've done it, though.

“I'll keep praying about it.”

Sometimes that's faithfulness.

Sometimes it's procrastination wearing church clothes.

There have been decisions where I genuinely needed more time before God. I've also had situations where another week of prayer wasn't going to reveal anything new.

I knew I needed to apologize.

I knew I needed to stop.

I knew I needed to follow through on something I'd promised.

I knew I needed to have the conversation.

Prayer wasn't the missing piece anymore.

Action was.

That distinction isn't always obvious, and I don't trust myself to get it right every time.

Somebody Once Asked Me A Question I Didn't Like

We were talking about a decision I had been praying over.

I explained the options, probably with more detail than necessary.

He listened.

Then he asked, “What would you do if you weren't afraid?”

I didn't appreciate the question.

Mostly because I had an answer.

I had been describing the situation as confusion.

Fear was probably closer.

Not completely. There were legitimate uncertainties involved. I don't want to rewrite the memory and make myself sound more insightful than I was.

But fear had a vote.

A large one.

I went home still irritated by the question.

It stayed with me for several days.

Some useful questions are like that.

Not Every Uncomfortable Thought Is God

This matters too.

I've met Christians who seem frightened of every thought that passes through their minds.

Maybe God is telling me to quit my job.

Maybe God wants me to give everything away.

Maybe God is warning me because I saw the same number twice.

Slow down.

An honest prayer to God doesn't mean treating every internal feeling as divine instruction.

We have Scripture.

We have wisdom.

We can seek godly counsel.

We can examine motives without assuming every anxious thought came from the Holy Spirit.

I've mistaken anxiety for guidance before.

I've probably mistaken preference for guidance too.

Humility has to leave room for the possibility that I heard myself.

That's not unbelief.

That's one reason I keep returning to Scripture instead of building my entire spiritual life around impressions.

The Phone Call Was Uneventful

I eventually made it.

I had rehearsed the conversation several times beforehand, which accomplished almost nothing because the other person didn't follow the script I'd written for them.

People are inconsiderate that way.

I apologized for my part.

They said a few things.

I listened.

We talked.

Nobody cried.

There was no dramatic reconciliation scene.

I didn't hang up feeling ten pounds lighter.

Mostly I remember thinking, Well, that needed to happen.

And then I went back to what I was doing.

The relationship wasn't magically transformed either.

Some things still needed sorting out.

At least I wasn't carrying the additional problem of refusing to own what belonged to me.

There Are Still Subjects I Approach Carefully With God

I'd like to say I learned my lesson and now fling every locked room of my heart open immediately.

I don't.

There are things I can talk to God about easily.

Other subjects take me a while.

Sometimes I notice myself changing the subject during daily prayer.

That's almost funny.

God knows exactly what I'm doing.

I'll start near something uncomfortable, drift toward another concern, pray for somebody else, remember a Scripture, and fifteen minutes later I've successfully avoided the thing while technically praying the entire time.

I catch myself more quickly now.

Not always.

There’s A Prayer I’ve Been Using Lately

It's not particularly impressive.

“Father, if I'm protecting something You want to deal with, help me stop protecting it.”

I don't pray it every morning.

I'm not sure I want to.

Because there are days when I'd rather receive encouragement than correction.

Probably everybody would.

Sometimes I need encouragement.

Sometimes I really am carrying something difficult and don't need to turn it into another exercise in self-examination.

But there are other times when I know exactly why a subject makes me uncomfortable.

I can feel myself becoming defensive before anyone has even accused me of anything.

That's usually worth noticing.

I have one of those situations right now, actually.

I haven't completely figured out what I'm going to do with it.

Part of me thinks I know.

Another part has several excellent arguments prepared.

I'm still praying.

And, if I'm being fair, I may already know enough to make the phone call.

Daily Effective Prayers Of The Week