Wondrous Help For When Words Fail

Heads bowed, and eyes closed the ups and downs of life weighing heavy on your heart and mind. Knowing you should pray to seek the Lord's will, guidance and way but haven't a clue where to start or what to say. Words fail and soon you muddle through the same repetitive prayer you pray each day. 

Sound familiar? 

Praying God's word can be extremely helpful in breaking up the malaise of your common prayers, and give you the words to express your deepest longings, greatest sources of anxiety and petition for God's miraculous grace to invade every corner of your world. 

Over the last several months, my wife and I have enjoyed reading through The Valley of Vision, a collection of puritan prayers and devotionals. The puritans, while just as flawed and broken as the rest of us, are a great source of joy and encouragement to this pilgrim's weary soul.

Oh how I long to study, think and pray as they did. They swam deep in the waters of God's word and it shows in every line they penned and in every prayer they wrote. God's word drips from their pen and leaves you wanting to know the Lord as intimately as these men from years long past.

Modern man can easily fall prey to believing he is more enlightened than men from ages long ago, but the eloquent writing found within the pages of these prayers displays and intellect well worth pursuing and emulating. Sentences carefully crafted, ideas grounded in both God's word and human experience, and a knowledge of the wickedness of their own hearts yields insights that transcend time.    

Not knowing what or how to pray is a conundrum each of us faces in the course of life. Thankfully God has given us both His word and the words of men carried along by His grace to provide a help to us. Below is one such prayer my wife and I read not too long ago. Notice the rhythm, rhyme, and grace of their words, but more than that notice the biblical truth that informed such a prayer.  

The Divine Will

O Lord,

I hang on thee; I see, believe, live,

when thy will, not mine, is done; 

I can plead nothing in myself

in regard of any worthiness and grace, 

in regard of thy providence and promises, 

but only thy good pleasure. 

If thy mercy make me poor and vile, blessed be thou!

Prayers arising from my needs are preparations for future mercies; 

Help me to honour thee by believing before I feel,

for great is the sin if I make feeling a cause of faith.

Show me what sins hide thee from me

and eclipse thy love;

Help me to humble myself for past evils, 

to be resolved to walk with more care, 

For if I do not walk holily before thee, 

how can I be assured of my salvation?

It is the meek and humble who are shown thy covenant,

know thy will, are pardoned and healed,

who by faith depend and rest upon grace,

who are sanctified and quickened, 

who evidence thy love.

Help me to pray in faith and so find thy will,

by leaning hard on thy rich free mercy,

by believing thou wilt give what thou hast promised;

Strengthen me to pray with the conviction

that whatever I receive is thy gift, 

so that I may pray until prayer be granted;

Teach me to believe that all degrees of mercy arise

from several degrees of prayer;

that when faith is begun it is imperfect and must grow,

as chapped ground opens wider and wider until rain comes.

So shall I wait thy will, pray for it to be done,

and by thy grace become fully obedient.  

What You Can Learn From A Blogging Failure

The Summer and Fall of 2015 were wonderful. Not only was I able to come home and join my wife in working full-time on our photography business, I also began writing again. Rejoining the blogging world was invigorating. It has been so good for my heart and soul. As the clock struck midnight and 2015 faded to black I was overjoyed to see what the new year would bring. Fast forward a few months and while much of the year has been amazing, the blog has been touch and go at best. Posts have been infrequent and I haven't been writing with any form of regularity.    

Why write?

Writing is an immensely personal thing. In writing you're translating thousands of thoughts, emotions and ideas from the muddled mess flying around in your head into something clear and intriguing. Letters, words, sentences and paragraphs that communicate something going on in you to the big old world out there. Maybe you noticed something while out on a walk, overheard a conversation in the grocery store or experienced something that got your mind twirling. Whatever it is, you have to write about it. Not because your thoughts, insights and quirky humor are better that others but for the simple reason that writing is what you do. You may not be good at a lot of things, heck you may not even be a "good" writer, but you process the events and emotions of life by putting words on a page. There is rarely anything so exhilarating as that rare moment when you communicate exactly what you're experiencing, or thinking in just the right sequence of words. It might not be Shakespeare but its about as close as you'll ever come. When that moment arrives, few things are as magical. 

Your writing goes far beyond mere expression and processing, it is an avenue to help, encourage and serve others. There are what 8 billion people in the world, a large swath of whom have internet access. It is safe to say that there are quite likely many other people walking through the exact same things as you are each and every day. Will all of them find your dinky little blog and read it? No they won't. What if however your writing finds it's way into the hands of one person somewhere in the world you've never met and most likely never will and it helps them? How marvelous an outcome would that be? I can think of no better outcome for my writing than for the words and sentences I slam together to in some small way help, uplift and encourage another. 

What makes writing so hard?

Few things are as terrifying as a white blank page. It can be utterly paralyzing. You freeze. You don't know where to begin, what to say or even how to say it. Paralyzing fear sets in and you can now think of a thousand other things you'd rather be doing than staring at this blank page, and pounding your head into the desk hoping words will come out. At that moment you wouldn't care what words came out. Any words will do. You are simply and utterly terrified. 

Sound familiar? I know it sure does to me. That is my life most days. I sit down to write and.....nothing. My mind goes blank and I just sit there staring at the screen hoping something will come to mind. As you talk with most people who enjoy writing you will find this is an entirely normal occurrence. Never mind that it's normal though, it is still down right frustrating. You want to write, you even have time set aside for this express purpose, but the words won't flow. And then it hits you. You're over thinking it and making things way harder than they have to be. You realize you don't have to pen a master piece, you just have to get words out of your head and on to the page. Nothing more nothing less. 

What can we learn from it?

I have written very little over the last several months. I've sat down to write, and the words just haven't been there. As I've tried to figure it out and put my finger on exactly what's going on in my heart a few things have stood out to me. 

1. Don't be overly concerned with what other people think. It's a killer. Being over concerned with the thoughts and opinions of others has stopped me from writing all together the last few weeks. The thought has been, "If I don't have anything 'good' and 'helpful' to say, I just won't write anything. After all, I'd hate to write something people dislike, and/or even laugh at. That would just be the worst." In reality, no one cares that much about what you write. Not that many people will read it anyway, so you might as well just write. If by some miracle someone does, so what if they don't like it. The worst that that can come of it, is just that, they don't like it or share it with their friends. That's not such a big deal when you pause to think about it. 

2. Your habits really matter. As I've mentioned, I've really dropped the ball and fallen out of the daily discipline of writing. Normally, I'm all about habits and routines. So much of your personal productivity is tied to the habits you keep. Its time to reconstruct my habits and reinstitute this all too important one into my day. Will I love or even like everything I write? No, but I'll be practicing and improving with each and every key stroke. And that the most important thing.

 3. Some things ebb and flow. One moment ideas, topics, analogies and all around genius seem to come pouring out of you. It just comes so easy. You know what you want to say, the words come quickly and you're done. Sadly, that isn't the case on most occasions. There is a grind to it. Most days you have to keep pushing, keep writing and rewriting until you complete something your satisfied with. 

4. Grace abounds. If you go a few weeks or months without writing consistently, it's not the end of the world. Writing after all is first and foremost a manner of expression and method of processing. The blog monster can be a mean one. One that can be overwhelming and demanding for sure. There can easily be a feeling that you "have to publish" on a particular schedule. Be free to publish on your very own schedule. There are no rules when it comes to blogging. Isn't that great news? You get to use it in whatever way you desire. So don't beat yourself up if you miss a day, a week or even a month. Just crack open journal, notebook or laptop and start writing again. 

How I Journal Daily

On Monday, we talked about how men and women throughout the ages have kept personal journals and three positive effects of daily journaling. If you missed it, run grab it so that you know where we are going today.

Today I want to help you establish journaling as a daily habit.

I'm sure that you've given journaling a shot once or twice before. Perhaps it didn't stick. Maybe you tried for a week or two, or maybe even three but eventually you stopped.

We usually fail to develop habits because we go about them unintentionally. We fail to think through the three main elements that matter. No matter the habit you are wanting to establish the three things you need to think through are: 

1. Time

Determine when you will journal. Ideally you would want to journal at the beginning of your day but in the end time of day isn't as important. Establish a time each day when you can retreat, think and write. Having a consistent time helps you in establishing a the habit as it becomes part of your routine. 

2. Place

Decide where you will journal. My wife has a favorite chair in our backyard that she enjoys spending her mornings in coffee in one hand and her journal in the other. Me, I prefer to sit in my office chair. No matter where you choose to write, pick a place and establish that as your daily journaling spot. Establishing a place helps root the habit to not just a time of day but also to a physical location. 

3. Plan

One of the most helpful ways to establish a journaling plan is to use a template. By using a template you'll remove the worry of what to write about. At first glance, this might appear confining but in reality it will create freedom. To create your very own journaling template spend some time thinking of a few questions that will help you process the day before, access how you are feeling & plan for the day ahead.

Not sure what questions to ask yourself? Below is an image of the journaling template I've been using.

My hand writing can be difficult to read at times so here are the eight questions I'm currently using:

Yesterday

1. What did I do yesterday? (hit the high notes. What do you want to remember?)
2. What lessons did I learn?

Now

3. What am I thankful for right now?
4. How am I feeling right now?

Today

5. What have I read in the last 24 hours? (record everything you've read since you last journaled. Maybe even a few important insights.)
6. What are my plans for today? (Review schedule and major tasks)
7. What one thing must I accomplish today?
8. Who will I see today and can I intentionally add value to their day?

Below is one of my real journal entries from the past few weeks. 

As you can see I ask myself the 8 questions and then write out my answers to each prompt. It is simple and helps me narrow my focus to the areas that really matter to me. If you're having difficulty coming up questions of your own, grab these and give them a try. Over time you will tweak the questions and eventually arrive at a template of your own.

7 Day Experiment: Establish a time, place and plan for journaling. Then give it a try for 7 days and let me know how it goes.