Finding Time to Pray When Time Isn’t Your Friend
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When I wrote Scheduling Time with God Midst the Busyness of Life, the topic didn’t seem very new, but God was speaking to my own heart about spending time with Him in my current stage of life. Usually when the Holy Spirit is whispering to me about something, then I share it with you.
When I get together with the #ungluedsistas and we chat, we often find similar situations with which we are dealing. One that surfaced this past Saturday was that of spending time in prayer.
Let me begin by saying that I really do believe God loves it when we spend individual, undivided time in prayer with Him. Time that is specifically dedicated to Him and for Him.
However, if that is the ONLY time He gets, then we haven’t allowed His presence to live in our hearts as intended. So:
How do we find time to pray when time isn’t our friend?
In other words, when our children are in busy stages of life….
when we are working women…
when we have family responsibilities..
when we have to take care of our homes, our cars, whatever God has entrusted us with…
Honestly, we simply have conversation with God wherever we are.
Here are six places we can pray during everyday life. You ready?
1. At the kitchen sink.
My dishwasher is currently broken and while I’m washing the dishes, I pray. I look out the window into the sky and I just feel God smiling down on me. Sometimes I think He is really enjoying the fact that my dishwasher is broken! 🙂
2. While driving.
Don’t get too carried away with this one or you’ll miss a turn. Not that I’ve ever been known to do that. Ahem.
3. In the laundry room.
Laundry is not my favorite- can I just tell you that? By being purposeful about having conversation with God instead of my usual mental self-conversation, I can be thankful and praise instead of grumbling and complaining.
4. In waiting lines.
Whether it is the car pickup line, the drive-thru, the post office, or the bank, waiting lines are a great place to talk to God- whether it’s just one phrase of praise or your reminder was set to pray for Susie’s surgery. If you get honked at, assume it is because of your “Honk if you love Jesus” bumper sticker. (a joke. semi-funny joke, but still a joke.)
5. At the car wash.
You’re not going anywhere and I’m guessing the machine will run the way it did the last time. Now if you wash your car by hand, you can still do this. It might take more focus, yes, but you can do it. 🙂
6. Lying in bed.
The first thought in my head when I wake up is typically: “Lord, give us strength to live for you and glorify your name.” If it doesn’t pop into my head right away, then I at least make sure I say it before I stand up from the bedside.
At night, I often fall asleep while praying. I don’t think God is offended at that one bit. I think He loves it. This is when I pray for my husband too. Those of you who have read “The Sensational Scent of Prayer” might remember the story of how my husband worked night shift for ten of our married years until God answered our prayer for his job to change. The habit of praying for him while we are in bed lying next to one another is even more special because just having him home at this time of night is answer to prayer!
So I’ve given you a few of my times. How about you? I know you have some times that work for you and I’d so love it if you could share them. Or maybe you just never thought about praying to God anywhere at any time. There’s something so cool about having folks say- “Me too! ”
Tuesday I have a post up at Tommy Nelson- 5 Thoughts on Loving When It’s Not Easy. I’m guessing you might just know someone who is not so easy to love. 🙂 Hop over there after 10 am CST and take a peek!
Where do you find time to pray?
God sent me a sign that I haven’t taken enough time to pray recently….last night my kitchen faucet busted, sending a HUGE geyser of water spraying everywhere and all I did was laugh! It was at the end of a tough day, right after I’d finally sat down to relax and recharge for the next tough day. So, here I am laughing in my flooding kitchen while, thankfully Patrick is turning off the water (I wouldn’t have even know where/how to do it) and fixing it by putting on an old leaky faucet that he’d hung on to “just in case”. 40 minutes later, we are finally sitting down to relax.
This morning, I’ve already had a worse day than yesterday. Now, as I’m on my 3rd batch of dishes for the day and listening to my favorite Gospel which is unfortunately the only time I usually have to do it without interruption, I realized that I am feeling recharged just listening and talking to God at my sink. I thought of this post, which I read a while ago and at the time was glad to know that I’m not alone in where/when I pray. So, this made me realize suddenly that there was a very good reason why my faucet broke when it did. WE had said last night, Thank God it didn’t break while we were sleeping but happened when we were right there to handle it. Yes, THANK GOD!
oh goodness! I so know how you feel and wow, what a great thing about being awake to handle the problem!! Love your perspective- thank you so much for sharing this!
One of the places I pray is in the shower. Along with waking me up, it seems to bring out my requests to God.
I have trouble with the eloquent long prayers, I seem to lose focus or repeat myself. Do you have any suggestions on how to pray?
I enjoyed reading this. My three favorite are the car, praying right before bed and as soon as I wake up. As these are three I do on a daily basis. I loved the laundry, too. I always tell myself I will not complain about all the laundry I have but instead be thankful for it.: )
I often pray while in the shower.. it’s a quiet time that I have all to myself.
yep. I totally get that. 🙂
Hi everyone, I live with my cat Mia, and God so I talk to God all the time, I’m always asking Him to give me the strength to do something, for example to help me shovel the 2 feet of snow we got this past weekend. I sleep in His arms every night. I’ve grown Spiritually these past 3 years since my surgery. Living by myself, gives me alot of time to be with Our Heavenly Father, that is why He created us, to be with Him. I try to focus on Him as much as I can during the day, it’s hard sometimes because life gets in the way, but He’s helping through the tough times.
May God Bless everyone and have Mercy on us. Have a good week.
I pray in bed too – and like you, spend time there praying for my husband and giving thanks that he’s home with me (not working an overnight or away with the Army). I take a long time to fall asleep, so I also use that as my daily intercession time.
love it. 🙂
Terrific list. I pray while blogging … when I need time to think through a topic or realign my thoughts, I usually pray, and when I do, needs filter in. The Holy Spirit is GOOD, huh?
Another good time to pray is in the shower, or while cooking! Anytime your mind doesn’t need to be totally focused on the task at hand is a good time to turn that focus towards prayer!
so true! 🙂