I have a friend who’s becoming a speech language pathologist. She really enjoys the pediatric population and spends a lot of her time working with kids. We had dinner the other day and she was telling me about how sometimes parents bring their kids for their first visit when they’re 4 or 5, at which time their language development should be well on their way. These kids she sees; however, have a lot of trouble with language. Specifically she told me about one girl who couldn’t make most of the consonant noises we need to make in order to speak intelligibly. And this child first came to see them at age 5, when ideally, she should have been in at age 2 or 3.
Now, the reason it had taken so long for her to come in was because her parents didn’t recognize that she had a problem. There’s this really neat phenomenon whereby parents are often able to understand their children’s communication that the rest of us would be fully unable to decipher. And this had been the case with this young girl, leading to a delayed recognition of this problem until she finally went to school.
So, I think that’s how God is. I think when we pray, our words are often wrong and we don’t know what to ask for or how to pray. We want what is good, we want our friends’ troubles to be eased and our families to be reunited. But I certainly don’t always feel like I know how to ask for that. There’s this funky balance of asking for what I want and think is right and then also just asking God for His will to be done.
As I heard this young girl’s story, I thought it was a beautiful illustration of how our Father hears us when we come to Him in prayer. We may not always be eloquent, we may not ask for the right things or use the rights words – but I think we can certainly be assured that just as a parent understands their child, so, too, does God our Father. He hears our cries, knows our intent and is always faithful to respond.
With this assurance, I think we ought to throw ourselves recklessly into prayer. I think it’s our job to get on our knees and trust that the spirit of God will guide as we pray. I think we need to beg for mercy for ourselves, our families, our friends and our country. And I think we will never be disappointed if we trust that God will do with our prayers what is good and right.
