24/7

Last week I went to Charlotte's 24/7 Prayer Room after work.  In the midst of my busy, crazy everyday life, my daily prayer/study discipline can have moments where things get well, mundane, routine, and slightly stale.  I don't want a mundane or stale relationship with God....so I try to mix things up.  Plus, my soul has been extra thirsty for God the past several weeks, so visiting the prayer room seemed like a great idea.

It had been probably a year since I went to 24/7, but I love the quiet, the candles, the decorations, and the peaceful, uniquely powerful environment for prayer and study.  The prayer room has stations with guided study and meditations, as well as couches and tables, with maps for specific prayers for Charlotte and our world.

Well, last week there was a small group meeting in the couches.  And they were loud.  Like talking in normal voices not about their study, but life and social plans.  Their kids started screaming.  The volunteer staff was walking outside the station where I was praying, talking about how the candles at my station needed to be changed and updated.

Sadly, by this time I was getting tetchy and honestly far from being a child of the God of grace.  I mean, I NEEDED to hear from God that afternoon, people!  Why were they interfering with the special ambiance of the prayer room, the 'peace for the urban soul' they advertise and that I'd experienced in the past?!

As you can imagine, as probably happens to my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, God totally broke me at that point and brought my sin smack up into my face.  Who am I to need mountaintop experiences frequently in my faith?  I needed to learn to hear God amidst the noise of the prayer room, to be more able to hear him in my daily life, my daily prayer discipline, in the noise of Charlotte as well as the peace and quiet.

Then God did speak to me, challenge me, grow me.  It was amazing and beautiful and painful all at the same time.  I loved it.  He showed me to study, really study, the book of Joshua.  It is so amazing and wonderful I feel as if my heart will explode.  Surely more blog posts to come from that experience!

Prayer request of a fellow 24/7-er that broke me.

"Only be strong and very courageous, being careful to do according to all the law that Moses my servant commanded you.  Do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go.  This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it.  For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.  Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and courageous.  Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go."
     -Joshua 1: 7-9