…Day after day and night after night they keep on saying, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty—the one who always was, who is…

… and who is still to come.” Rev. 4:8

Prayer and attitude have been on my heart this week, quite a bit. A friend had some thoughts on how to approach prayer. Not my sometimes-typical laundry list of needs and wants, but an approach that includes a sense of reverence and wonder. I guess I have moments when I experience that level, but admittedly hadn’t spent a lot of time on it.
One of the passages my prayer-warrior friend suggested was Revelation 4. I’m going to confess here that Revelation is a tough book for me. It is the book of the Bible that I find most intimidating. So, seeing that on the list was scary to me. I jostled that around in my head for a couple of days before I determined that I needed to get over it and study it. There was something powerful in it and I needed to understand it. Imagine yourself in the presence of God, my friend suggested. Oh boy, that’s a big statement. Where do I even start? I’ve always loved “I Can Only Imagine” by Mercy Me. I could relate to that inability to know how I’d react.

Surrounded by Your glory, what will my heart feel

Will I dance for you Jesus or in awe of you be still

Will I stand in your presence or to my knees will I fall

Will I sing hallelujah, will I be able to speak at all

I can only imagine

So, as I pondered reading the Scripture, I wondered where my heart would land. Nervously, I opened to Revelation 4 and read. As I was reading the passage noted above, my radio was playing in the background. AT THAT moment “Revelation Song” came on! Whoa. The line in the song directly from Revelation 4:8 was playing just as I was reading it. A true God-incident, I believe. I stopped reading, listened to more of the song and then went back to the Scripture. And something clicked. What am I afraid of? This book and the entire Book is a gift from our Maker.

After reading through that passage, and a couple others recommended, I started to get it. I need a different approach to prayer life. An attitude of reverence was a natural response when I read through these passages.

God so beautifully gave us His word for us to use as our guide. I realize that in my prayer life, I’m not connecting the dots, per se. I was separating “prayer” as that conversation about the things on my heart and the situations, concerns and conditions that are on my prayer list. While there’s nothing wrong with that, I haven’t been taking that next step, into the next level. The more appreciative, humble approach that starts and ends with reading the Scripture and meditation that my friend recommends, demonstrates how significant God is and how insignificant I am. And yet, even with that, He loves me and wants that intimate relationship. I think I’m about to have a breakthrough and really begin growing in that relationship.

He places people, instances and relevance in our lives for His glory and purpose. I’m so grateful that He’s moving in my life. I thank my prayer-mentors for their guidance and encouragement. And I praise God for knitting them into my little life so that He will be glorified.

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