What Stays Between You and God?

There are lots of things that go on in my life that stay between God and me. I probably worded it a bit differently at the time, but that was a statement I made a couple of months ago when I was talking to a friend of mine. At the time of that conversation and many other times throughout my life, I attempted to justify it in my head in a number of ways, but the more I think about it, the more I realize that's probably not always a good thing.

As I've gone about my life over the past 30-plus years, I've often been given the impression, if not outright told, on a number of occasions that the things I struggle with that I don't talk about are my fault, so it's on me to deal with them. On top of that, I often find myself simply not wanting to burden others with my problems. As the perfectionist I am, there are many things I think I shouldn't still struggle with and other things I think I just should handle on my own.

As I've gotten older, though, I've come to realize just how flawed that mentality is. Yes, there are times when everyone should at least put some thought into how they request prayer and what sorts of things they ask others to pray for, but that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with asking.

Why, though, if asking isn't inappropriate, should we be careful how we make requests for prayer? If someone who's being asked to pray for another person doesn't understand what's going on, they can't be expected to pray intelligently. If we don't pray intelligently, what makes us think we can expect the specific things we pray for can be granted to us?

Yes, it's always true that God knows all and can see everything going on in our lives without being told, but it's also true that He wants us to come to Him with all of our needs and much like Jesus did when he encountered the two blind men on His way out of Jericho, He wants our requests to specifically detail what's really wrong.

In Matthew 20:31, the two blind men begged Jesus to "Have mercy on us!" His response in the following verse was to simply ask, "What do you want Me to do for you?" As soon as that question was answered with specificity, the two men were granted their sight.

Exactly the same thing will happen for us, if we not only pray for ourselves in the same specific way, but if we ask others to do the same. Not only that, but if we keep things to ourselves and never ask others to pray for us, how can we expect our fellow Church members to thoroughly abide by the command to pray for one other given in James 5:16?

This is something I've struggled with for many years and still do, to this day. I often find myself thinking my problems are my own to deal with and others have enough going on, or I get embarrassed to admit that I'm struggling with this or that. I know I'm not the only one who has such feelings, but I also know I'm not really justified in any of them.

As 1 Corinthians 10:13 tells us, no temptation will overtake anyone except that which is common to man, meaning there's always someone else who has fought the same battles we're fighting and struggled with the same things we're currently struggling with, so there's no reason for me to think I'm in some kind of unique situation no one else has ever struggled to beat.

Yeah, you may be right that what you're struggling with is bad, but I can promise you, God will always want to help you and there will always be many other Christians around you who feel the same way. If you're embarrassed by your own struggles and sins, good. That means you're already on the path to the forgiveness we all seek.