Read: James 5:13a

As James draws his letter to a close, he throws out a bunch of snappy encouragements. First, he says "be quick to pray."

When trouble hits - real trouble, the it-feels-like-the-end-of-the-world kind of trouble, our instinct takes over and we go into survival mode. We panic, or we engineer, we scream and yell, we call our best friend, we run away. James suggests we adopt a new strategy: prayer as first response.

The real challenge of prayer is whether we really believe God is listening, that he cares to hear our anguish and has our best interest at heart, and that he has the power to do what he thinks the best for us. If we don't come to God first when we are in trouble, chances are, we don't trust him, don't think he is listening, don't care about us, don't do what we want him to, or doesn't have the power to help us in the way we want. If prayer is not our first response, it is because we think someone else can do a better job saving us. The first place we turn is where we think real help is.

For five chapters, James has been talking about authentic spirituality - walking the talk. If our commitment to God ought to find expression in how we live, if our actions should match our words, then our pray life ought also to reflect our dependance on God.

Of course, it is completely nature to doubt God, and to disagree with his solutions. But we pray not because we get to dictate to God as if he is a genie in a bottle. We pray because we need him, and we need to experience how he is indeed for us.

Write
Think about your faith story: in times of trouble, what is your typical first response? In what ways you have experienced God in prayer?

What keep you from praying? What do you doubt: God, his attention to you, his commitment to your good, his power to rescue you?

What situations presently provides natural incentive to pray?

Pray
What is God saying to you today?

Talk to God about the quality of your conversations with him, the frequency of your conversations, and the quickness to run to him.

Talk to God about the doubts you have about him. Ask him how you can cooperate in building a memory of his faithful toward you.

Talk to God about where you need his help presently.

Pray for an experience of God's love, grace and mercy as you learn to be quick to pray, and as you learn how God hears your prayers, how he is for you, how he is all powerful, and how he has your back.