Challenge: Act

Reading and praying have been hard this morning.  There are days when I can read and speak words, but the meaning is just not there.  That is today.  The fog of sinus pressure and a bit of lethargy are hindering my mental processing.

But, one thing did break through my fog, and it made me take a look at how I handle certain prayer requests. 

I’ve mentioned before that bed-wetting runs in my family.  All three of my children have been very late developing the ability to stay dry at night.  Steven is thankfully the only one who still deals with the issue, and I am actively praying that he will outgrow it soon.

The problem is that my only activity is prayer.  I keep thinking I need to get him up to go potty right before I go to bed.  But, I forget.  I pray that the Lord will remind me, but He doesn’t.  And yet I’ve had this nagging inclination to set an alarm that will go off each night to remind me to take Steven to the bathroom.  The thought has been there for months, but I’ve done nothing about it.  Until this morning.  Just now I actually acted on setting the alarm as a reminder.

I tend to err in two ways when it comes to prayer.  I either act first with only a nominal effort put toward seeking God’s direction or I pray and then do nothing, just waiting for God to act while I sit and act the part of spectator.   

Neither course is right.  I must pray first.  Then I must obey.  I’m not a spectator.  I’m a growing child.  I don’t let my children ask me for things and then sit and wait for me to do it all for them.  They ask and then I give them an instruction to act upon.  My challenge is to listen for the action instruction.  The action might end up being the act of waiting, but if I’m not listening I’ll never know!