Prayer meetings

It's a new month! Boy, the last one went by quickly. So new topic now. I'm sure some of you are saying, "Finally! I almost expected you to break out in some sappy Bon Jovi song". Maybe someday I'll tell you about the song I wrote for Bon Jovi.... Anyway, let's get it started!

Does your church have weekly or monthly prayer meetings? Let’s see by the number of hands how many of you, dear readers, have been told that the most important thing to do is pray. Ok, you can put your hands down, you look silly raising your hands, and plus, I can’t really count them, no matter how good this Internet thing is. Yes, even webcams won’t help much either.

Next time, walk down the Religion aisle in your nearest bookstore, and I bet you’d see hundreds of books on the subject of prayer alone. Well, you would see hundreds if your nearest Borders or Barnes and Noble had a large selection of Religion. Nowadays, you’d be lucky to even find the Christian books among the 30 or so world religions all packed in one small bookshelf labeled, “Religion and Spirituality”. One of the most popular books (in the Christian world) is a book about prayer, “Prayer of Jabez”. It’s amazing how someone could write a whole book (albeit very small) just on one line of a Bible verse stuck between the geneleogy of the Hebrew kings.

The Bible, in one of the clear and unequivocal directives, states that we should pray. It is likened as a sacrifice, a communication device to our Lord, a shield for us, a comfort, and spiritual sustenance. However, despite all this overwhelming evidence about the benefits of prayer, how come no one goes to prayer meetings? I myself am guilty of this as well. I went there once, and I was surprised at how many people regularly attend. With just a friend and me, we nearly doubled the size of the prayer group.

Obviously, I would be a total hypocrite, hypocritus maiorus, if I was writing to tell you to go to these very important prayer meetings. Therefore, I’m going to tell you the reasons I don’t go to prayer meetings, and then maybe, if I have any ideas, I’ll let you know ways to combat those well-thought out (at 11:50p on Wed) reasons for not going. So stick around for the next few weeks as I give you the “Top Ten Reasons Nate Doesn’t Go to Prayer Meetings.”* Kinda catchy, huh? Do you think Letterman would use these in one of his shows? And if someone in charge of prayer meetings, actually does listen to my suggestions and implements them, I will definitely (maybe, if I have time, no other plans) be there! You can (sorta) count on it!


* Please note, that they are in no particular order and may not actually add up to Ten.