Prayer in the Morning

I heard my father quote Psalm 5:3 as I crossed the room during a week of prayer two years ago, and I remember vaguely thinking, It is not a bad idea to start praying early in the morning and see what happens. That was all—an electrical signal that swiftly crossed my mind that led to a thought formation in fractions of a second and fell silent just as quickly.

The evening continued normally. I went to bed, closed my eyes, and fell into a deep sleep until my alarm rang at 7:20 A.M. A green check, “Approve,” and a red X, “Reject,” lit the screen. I had nothing urgent planned for the morning and had hoped to get a little extra sleep, but I got up and went to the kitchen. What to do now? I wondered.

Then it occurred to me that I did not set the alarm.

In fact, I had stopped all alarms before I went to bed.

And I had never seen an alarm that showed an Approve or Reject option.

I returned to my room with tears in my eyes at the sweet realization and fell to my knees to thank my God for the kind way He chose to tell me He wanted us to start the day together. So many times, we have it backward. We pursue all kinds of other things and forsake the King and His kingdom. So often we want the things God promises without doing what God requires for His promise to become ours. God told the children of Israel, “If you pay attention to the commands of the LORD your God that I give you this day and carefully follow them, you will always be at the top, never at the bottom” (Deuteronomy 28:13, NIV).

He told us to make God our priority. Jesus expressed it in these words, “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33, NIV). And Mark tells us, “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35, NIV).

Do you remember how many miracles Jesus did after that, how many temptations He overcame? Can you imagine how great was the power Jesus received from His Father that He was strengthened to suffer and die for our redemption? Now imagine what Jesus could do through us if we would dedicate time each day to spend with Him in prayer!

Viktoria Ivanova