The Power of Stillness Part 3: Prayer That Builds Relationship

Sometimes prayer feels like pleading and begging for something to change.
Just Hoping God will fix the one thing that feels like the linchpin to our happiness.

But what if prayer was never meant to be a tool to manage our life, and was always meant to be relationship?

In Part 3 of The Power of Stillness, I’m sharing something the Lord has been teaching me, especially through my chronic health journey. There was a moment when I felt prompted to stop praying for healing,and instead start praying for trust and alignment.

And it changed the way I commune with Him. If you’ve ever felt like God was far away in your most sincere prayers, this episode is for you.

🎧 Episode 174 is live.

The Power of Stillness Book

Transcript

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Hello and welcome to the Latter Day Ladies podcast. I'm your host and your friend Jenny Moss, and today on episode 1 74, we're gonna talk about communing with the Lord. This is a continuation on our series of the power of stillness. If you have not yet listened to episode one and two of the series, I highly recommend going back and. Catching up because these principles build upon each other and they really do inform each other. So without further ado, here is part three of our Power of Stillness series. I wanted to share some of the things that I've been pondering on in the last two weeks, and I hope that you're able to hear the spirit as. We have our little chat today, and that this can help you maybe even a little bit on your journey with communication with God. So the word communion or commune means to converse or communicate intimately. I find it very interesting that Richard G. Scott said this quite a while ago. He said, many voices from the worlds in which we live tell us that we should live at a frantic pace. There is always more to do and more to accomplish, yet deep inside each of us is a need to have a place of refuge where peace and serenity prevail, a place where we can reset, regroup, and reenergize to prepare for future pressures. I love that he talks about it as a place of refuge. I realized I could create that space in my mind, a peaceful place to find refuge with the Lord. I then couch pondering and imagined a place of stillness, much like the celestial room, a place of quiet where I could sit and simply pray and ponder. And so I went to that place and. I asked the Lord if there was anything that he needed to talk to me about, and it took a while for the Lord to give a simple response. And even though it was very simple, it was very profound to me at that time, and I realized that I don't need to have a 20 minute conversation with the Lord giving me a huge monologue of things that he needs me to do. Oftentimes it is a simple prompting, a simple idea As I check in with him and go to that place of refuge, there are little building blocks that come with that simple prompting in the book, the Power of Stillness, which is what this series is based on. It says this quote, it is not the quiet alone that's powerful. Rather, the quiet prepares a space where God can work along with a willingness to pause our own will. Yield to whatever we encounter. We've seen how guided meditation can help us clear out the clutter in our mind in a way that helps connect us to God more tangibly and meaningfully. President David O. McKay taught the people that people would find most inspirational moments come coming. When you are alone with yourself and your God, after characterizing meditation as a form of prayer, he then described this as one of the most secret, most sacred doors through which we pass into the presence of the Lord. I found that terminology very interesting, that prayer can become a door where we pass into the presence of the Lord likened to passing through the veil in the temple. Stepping into the Celest room, we are able to do that after we receive the preparation and the gift of the endowment. We are then given the opportunity to pass into the presence of the Lord. It makes sense that if we want to have the same type of communion, the same type of connection. Here in the world, we need to prepare ourselves to receive inspiration and receive peace. I felt very called out by this next quote from the book quote, when was the last time you knelt down, breathe deep and then begged God for something to stop or go away or change this kind of plea? For God to do something is not uncommon. Help my wife to guide us so that we. What we can do more, soften his heart, take this away. In these moments, we think of ourselves as being fully present with God. After all, we're focused. We're petitioning his attention, and we're very sincere with our request. So why does God feel so far away in such a needful time? Perhaps God seems distant because we've fallen into using prayer to get what we want. As a tool to make our own agenda happen. This kind of subtle aggression involved in trying to push God to do something for us also demonstrates an underlying anxiety and limited trust in him. In this mind state author Richard Rohr cautions, you will not access the holy because the only thing that gets in. What you already think, what you already agree with, and what does not threaten you in that state. How can we possibly expect to receive more as he puts it? If you aren't ready for more, how could you possibly be ready for God? End quote. I loved that quote so much. Because I've had many instances in my life, especially in my chronic health journey, where I've just been in excruciating pain and prayed desperately for the Lord to take it away. I remember the first time that I felt prompted to not pray for healing from my chronic illness, I almost didn't wanna say the words out loud. I didn't wanna admit that that could be a possibility, but when I did, I felt peace and then I felt prompted to pray for different things, like to ask to see the people who would help me on the days that my chronic illness was particularly bad, or to pray to see how the Lord has prepared my life to be able to accommodate my chronic illness. It is difficult. To lay aside our will and to be willing to hear what God has to say. It was a beautiful connection point for us, and I felt like my trust in him and our relationship grew a lot deeper during that experience, and I noticed so much more the way that God showed up in my life and it was able to. Be a conduit for our relationship rather than something that created space in between us. This next quote about relationship is wonderful, quote, thoughtful, mindful, reverent. Prayer is about cultivating a relationship with God as a real being. To whom we can speak genuinely, intimately and personally. That two-way communication is a big part of transforming, saying a prayer. Into being with God. President McKay's habit was to go into a darkened room, a private room, kneel at the center of the room, not on a chair, not against a bed, and he would kneel and say nothing. This is before the prayer started. He would say nothing for a matter of minutes until he felt he was ready to approach the throne of the Lord to come before deity, and then he would wait after speaking. Give the Lord a way to answer and speak back. End quote. This approach to conversing with God aligns so much more in my brain with the way that celestial room prayers are. They're quiet, they're thoughtful, they're full of pondering and openness. I feel a lot more ready to hear what God wants to say about the things in my life after I have. Prepared myself to hear them because sometimes all we want is for that comfort or that thing to be taken away in our life. That's bringing frustration and stress. All we want is that one thing that we feel like could be the linchpin in our happiness, but being able to slow down and hear God, it helps us have that celestial perspective. I wanna end with this quote I love. What they said in the book, rather than a duty or something to get done. Prayer can thus become a communing act of intimacy instead of an instrumental tool towards our favorite ends and agendas, this kind of prayer becomes a unification, or at one meant a way to consistently bring our heart and mind into alignment with God. I have one last quote to share with you from the prophet Joseph Smith. He said this quote, when you feel pure intelligence flowing into you, it may give you sudden strokes of ideas so that by noticing it, you may find it fulfilled the same day or soon. And thus, by learning the spirit of God and understanding it, you may grow into the principle of revelation, end quote. I know I've shared this a couple times, but I feel like it's an incredibly powerful way to teach what it is like to learn how to pray, to learn how to commune, and to learn how to hear the voice of the Lord. It is our job to grow into this principle. Our prayers are a constant practice and our ability to focus our minds and hearts may ebb and flow with the different things that are going on with our life. I hope that all of us can commit ourselves today to having more fulfilling prayers by creating a space for the Lord to speak to us, for us to be able to align our will with God, for us to know how to hear him, and when to create that space. I love you guys. Thank you so much for listening to the Latter Day Ladies podcast. I'm so grateful to have you here, and if you've been inspired by this episode, please consider sharing it with a friend. Or rating and reviewing our podcast on Apple Podcasts. It helps other people find us. I hope you have an amazing week and take care. Bye.