By Jimi Gale
We made it! 52 ways to pray - one for each week of the year.
Our hope for this blog was to inspire and encourage the ST ‘family’ to pray more and in new ways. We want to say a massive thank you to all who have made that a reality by contributing. I have enjoyed and benefitted from each and every blog.
The variety we’ve enjoyed along the way is revealed in where we started and now finish. Our first way to pray was one of the most traditional and well known - The Lord's Prayer. Number 52 is something completely of the moment, that few would have even experienced when 52WTP began - praying via Zoom.
One of my highlights of lockdown has been praying with the Stewards’ Trust ‘family’ in this way each week. In a world lacking connection, I can connect with people and God at the same time. I can join with friends from all round the country, who I wouldn’t normally be able to pray with. I can pray with different generations. We have laughed together and cried together. Spoken prayers of thankfulness, intercession and repentance. Prayed in tongues, prayed psalms, prayed in song. I always leave feeling better than when I arrived. Eyes lifted up, heart softened, closer to the one who made me, more in tune with His way.
And so, both 52WTP and our recent Zoom prayer meetings lead me to the same simple and obvious conclusion; there are so many wonderfully different and creative ways to pray.
Why though? Surely one would do the job. For me, the variety and choice reveals how eager God is to hear from us, to speak to us, to connect with us. Just the same as for me, when one of my kids pops their head into my office during the day to say a quick hello. He loves it when we pray because He so loves us!
So, pick any one of fifty-two, pick another entirely. But don’t miss out on one of the most precious gifts we have available to us.