Milestones. When they come around, a great many are met with celebrations. My birthday some weeks back was no exception. An unexpected bonus got slipped in. The entry here, published in the TIMES paper where I’m privileged to offer up weekly articles, gives rise to much gratitude.
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This coming Monday, September 29, 2025, is to mark for me another completed circuit around the sun! This time, a noteworthy milestone – since my birth year is 1945. And, it happens that, to my great pleasure, I will be in Okmulgee, the city of my childhood. How cool will it be – strolling her streets on my eightieth, accompanying an assembly of fellow Jesus-followers. Praying with them over this very special community. (If you’re so inclined, come join the fun!)
But wait. Prayer? Fun?
Just to be clear, interceding (verbally appealing to the Lord in the heartfelt care of others) is not to be summed up solely by the word fun. However. If praying, when examined across the pages of the Bible and through the centuries of its practice demonstrates anything, it is this.
Christ means for joy to mark the lives of his apprentices.
“Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, ‘I praise you, Father. . .'”; “ I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.*
When petitioning God about things on our hearts we may indeed groan at times. Over the state of our world, over our homelife, over the lives of others in their crushing needs. This is part of authentic praying and is often modeled for us in Scripture. The Spirit of our Lord calls us to it. Bob Pearce, founder of World Vision Intl., captures the sentiment as well as anyone, “Let my heart be broken by the things that break the heart of God”.
Still, where praying can, and often does, include the groan of lament (passionate expression of grief or sorrow), such heaviness of expression does not fully reflect the disposition of prayer. Not at all.
Scripture is generously peppered with the sounds of God’s children, his apprenticing followers, freely voicing their joyous, celebratory (fun-filled) declarations to him. We are urged to jump into the fray. “Rejoice in the Lord always”, Paul exhorts, then adds, as if to ensure that we catch the Father’s happy longing, “. . again I will say, ‘rejoice!”**
A helpful posture of heart is called for at our meetings-up with Christ. Whether in praying or in serving, whether through lament or celebration, the believer is not called upon to “make something happen”.
Teeth-gritting, fist-clinching attempts at praying are foreign to the way of journeying with the Lord Jesus – Inventor of the easy yoke.
©2025 Jerry Lout *Luke 10:21 , John 15:11 **Philippians 4:4
An exceptional blog. Must reading for everyone. Very timely.
Thanks very much, friend!