Scripture Saturday/ Matthew 25:14-30

I'm continuing on this journey of increasing my prayer life.  And God has been faithful!  I sound shocked, and I shouldn't be.  Of course God is faithful.  It is me, in my little faith, that keeps me from pursuing Christ in full abandon, the way I should.

This morning, as I lay in bed praying before getting up, I was reminded of the passage in Matthew 25: the parable of the talents.  A man, going on a journey, called his servants and entrusted his property to them.  To one he gave five talents, to one two, and to another one talent, each according to his ability.  After a long time, the master returned and settled accounts with them.  The man who received the five talents brought another five.  The master replied, "Well done, good and faithful servant!  You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things."  The man with the two talents gained two more, and the master replied, "Well done, good and faithful servant!  You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things."  And the man who had received one talent hid the talent in the ground, giving the master back what belonged to him.  The master replied, "you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so when I returned I would have received it back with interest.  Take the talent from  him and give to the one who has the ten talents.  For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have in abundance.  Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him."

As I reflect over the last couple of weeks, I see how the Lord entrusted me with praying for a few people, and as I have proved faithful, He has entrusted me with more.  I have had several people ask me to pray for specific things for them and I have been willing to do so.  And the Lord has been gracious to lay them on my heart in continued prayer throughout the day.  In this, I recognize the Lord's hand because I don't know that this has happened very much in the past (people asking for specific prayer outside of times when we share prayer requests as a group), when I have not been very faithful to pray for others.

I'm not trying to toot my own horn.  And I'm definitely not saying that I have become a master pray-er, but I have taken baby steps, and as I have taken those steps, I have heard the Lord saying, "Teresa, now I can trust you with more."  It is a hard discipline, and it takes focus that my ADHD thoughts don't always grasp onto for long, but I have found that the Lord draws me near to him at random times--in the car, while I'm in the shower, when I wake up in the middle of the night, while I am doing mindless tasks--and I can say short prayers before my thoughts move on to other things.  So, as we pray with and for each other, you can lift me up that I might continue to focus on prayer as a discipline in my life.