“Sometimes the answer to prayer is not that it changes life, but that it changes you.”
- James Dillet Freeman, poet
I think I stumbled upon this quote at least eight or nine years ago, but I don’t really remember for sure. It sums up my experience with prayer, though, and every time I sit down and think about it, it makes me shake my head.
I don’t know about you, but when I pray, I want to change OTHER THINGS: the health situation of a loved one, the possible outcome of a job search, the way a decision is made. I rarely sit down and look toward God and ask for change for myself.
It’s not that I think I’m perfect…it’s that these OTHER THINGS need the attention more urgently. The baby who might die if she doesn’t receive a heart transplant is waaaay more important than my own struggle with a certain virtue.
What this quote reminds me is that, really, sometimes that answer is found in a change in the person praying. Being pregnant makes me think in a special way of how I prayed before Logan was born and of our recent year of change. The praying I did in 2002 did change me; I believe it not only gave me a heart for those who lose children and those struggling with fertility issues, but it also chipped away at some of the very large ego keeping me away from God.
The praying I have done this year has also changed me. We’re too close to it for me to understand how, but I can feel the shift inside.
And so, once again, I find myself looking at a favorite quote and seeing it in a new light. I’m glad for that.
Do you have a favorite quote about prayer?
Here at Snoring Scholar, you'll find marriage and motherhood, book talk and rambling remarks, observations and distractions, in the midst of life in rural Ohio on a farm, with kids, critters, and Catholic flair.
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