Intercessory prayer:

I've realized that I have this misguided view on praying for others. Why do i pray on behalf of other people? I suppose my primary reasoning is that it's sometimes the best way I can love them, especially when i'm far away and I can't DO anything to help them or to show them that I care. So b praying for them, it's like devoting my time to make sure they're taken care of.

But subconsciously, I have this "point" system going on in my head...and it often limits my view of God. Without realizing it, I approach intercessory prayer with the view that I have a certain finite number of "credits" with God. And when I pray for others, I'm sacrificing these "spiritual tokens" that could have been spent on praying for my own spiritual growth, needs, etc. and using it on others. So when i pray for others, I feel proud because in a way I'm bestowing them a very precious gift. While that's not a BAD motivation (that is, not inherantly evil in nature) it's quite misguided because it inadvertantly puts God in a box. It's operating under the assumption that, okay, God has only 24 hours in a day and while he can technically listen to everyone's prayers all at the same time (having super powers and all) he really wouldn't want to and actually only turns on his listening ears when I begin with, "God, are you there? It's me Andrea." (*laughs* for you beverly cleary fans you'll appreciate my allusion). But that's so not the case...God character has an infinite capacity - and what's more - WANT to listen to us. What's more, is that when we pray for others we are also praying for ourselves. Because when we pray genuinely...we are in a sense "exercising" our heart muscles.

So yup, those are my thoughts on intercessory prayer.

You might be wondering where this random discussion came from. Well, last night i went to "City Lights" fellowship at George Washington University. And Robert, the pseudo-counselor of the group, was speaking about the transforming of our minds as the key to understanding God's will. Typical stuff, i'm sure we've all heard before. But the thing that really struck me was how he emphasized the APPLICATION of transforming our THINKING. It's so difficult to do, and requires firstly that we recognize we can't do it without God's Holy Spirit and power and secondly, it means a serious commitment to discipline. It means training for that marathon that Paul talks about in the Corinthians. And for all your runners out there, you understand that when you train for a marathon you have to do a little bit EVERYDAY. Everyday you revisit what you learned yesterday, and you push the envelope just a little bit further. (hehe notice i didn't write "farther" which refers to distance...just a little grammar lesson I got a couple days ago!)