Are You Willing To Despair - Beginning To Pray

We work so hard to avoid despair. Most of our prayers are to avoid despair. We build lives of comfort to keep us from despair. In doing so, we never allow ourselves to fully lean on him.

Sometimes though, I just give up. My despair crushes me and takes the wind out of my soul. In these moments if I allow myself to pray, to read scripture, my emptiness allows something in that was shut out by my relentless drive for control, to do things myself. I discover that I’m not alone.

As Anthony Bloom said, "

“God Helps us when there is no one else to help. God is there at the point of greatest tension, at the breaking point, at the center of the storm. In a way despair is at the center of things – if only we are prepared to go through it.” 

“The day when God is absent, when He is silent – that is the beginning of prayer. Not when we have a lot to say. ”