Prayer and Train Tracks

Have you ever wondered what prayer is for? Train tracks can help us to understand.

For a train to run smoothly the tracks need to run parallel but God and us usually looks more like this set of tracks. God doesn’t change but we can be all over the place. There is absolutely no way a train will run on these tracks, the train will either grind to a halt or derail. Does your prayer life ever feel like this?

Some people believe that the purpose of prayer is for us to change Gods’ mind, that if only he thought more like us that things would be a lot better. Have you ever been angry with God because he didn’t do what you asked told him to do? Of course when we have these thoughts we forget that really we are all over the place and for God to be all over the place too would be a terrifying thing. There have been many times later in life when I’m really glad that God didn’t give me what I had asked for.

I believe that the purpose of prayer is for us to grasp more about who God is and to understand what he wants. As we talk with him in prayer, the purpose of the conversation is for us to surrender to the God who knows and sees more than we ever will. As we grasp who God is and what really matters to him and as we begin to pray about these things, then we are changed.

How would you describe your prayer life? A train wreck? A train breakdown? Chugging along? May we learn to listen to and be led by God as we talk with him in prayer.

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