Thoughts on Prayer

I learned something the other day, a spiritual truth, and I want to try and write it down. I hope I can explain it in a way that will be clear. Sometimes things are “lost in translation.”

Jared, who is very bright, had parent teacher conferences the other day. When I got home I was going over his scores with him and noticed that he had a poor grade on an essay test. I said, “You write well, why did you get such a poor grade?” He said, “I write well, but I don’t write fast. It took me 20 minutes just to think of what to write about.”

I said, “Well, Jared, if you went to you teacher and said, ‘I didn’t have time to finish – can I come back during lunch, or after school, and work on it some more?’ I am sure your teacher would let you. Your teachers know you can do well, and they want you to succeed. Sometimes you just have to ask for help.” And then I felt a little light go on in my head and I said, “It’s just like prayer.”

As the truth of that sunk in, I realized that it was very much like prayer. Heavenly Father wants us to succeed. He knows we can do it. He is willing to bless us. If we would rather say “no, I don’t want to ask… no, I’m embarrassed to ask… no, I’ll just take care of it myself,” then Heavenly Father will let us take care of it ourselves. Agency is so important that He will never force any thing on us, including blessings. If we are willing to trust in the arm of the flesh and muscle it out ourselves, he will let us have what we want.

But if we ask, we can be sure our petition will be considered as much as any concerned parent/teacher who wants us to learn, who wants us to succeed.