I am curious about the idea of praying with scripture. The children and I have been memorizing our latest memory passage, and just today at lunch we prayed the passage we worked on at breakfast. "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." Ephesians 4:29 At the same time, we personalized it.
So I decided to google the idea. Not that I have never heard of it, I just have never practiced it. I discovered a fresh perspective. God, in Genesis, states that He spoke creation into existence. Now did He have to do this? Was it necessary for Him to actually speak it? Couldn't He have "thought" it into existence?
I wonder if by praying the scripture aloud and by personalizing appropriately if we are actually speaking His Words into existence in a different way. Perhaps, we are personally affirming His Words, and yet at the same time allowing Him to speak fresh breath upon us and our lives. Because, His word we know is INSPIRED or God-breathed.
Too often I underestimate, take for granted, and stop short of fully embracing that reality. Rather than reading His words into life, I read them as a status post that was written ages ago. Written to only refer to how He worked then, versus affirming His continued work and embracing these Words of His as conversations that He wants to engage in with me, today.
I do read them knowing He wants to speak to me but perhaps it is deception to think that He only wants to use them as a lesson to point me in the right direction. Far above a lesson He may be actually directing my own circumstances through the living, breathing, and receiving of His Word and these Faith gifts in such a way that I speak or rather allow Him to speak it through me into life, into my own life. As I ponder the ones He chose to share with me, it is more than coincidental that each one can represent different stages of our own journey.
His Word, a faith gift; waiting to be received, affirmed, embraced, spoken into existence through my commitment to Him and His Word.
How moving, stirring, and up-lifting to restate His Words on our behalf so that we might draw closer to Him. Not only for benefit, but for the mutual response of the Spirit. He finds joy in our drawing toward Him.
