Praying “ineffectively” (my definition) was my worst nightmare when our first-born son died of cocaine intoxication, leaving a wife, two tiny girls and a son not yet born. I simply had to choose between unbelief and trust. I chose trust probably because I’m a stubborn soul.

Over the years, I began to understand what Jeff just pointed out that prayer is our privileged gateway to a relationship with the Almighty GOD, our Father, who desires a Father-child relationship with His own–a “right relationship” as Oswald Chambers says. Our struggles do make us stronger and if we, like those “desert fathers and mothers,” wait on the Lord, He will satisfy our souls. Wait on the Lord…I love that song we sing during Taize worship.

Blessings, Mike, as the Spirit leads you for Sunday’s sermon. I’m praying for you.

I believe that we have special struggles with this in our society since we are prone to define ourselves and our life-quality in terms of being able to exercise our choices, get the things we want, and seeing our desires typically fulfilled as our daily lives take shape. This is not to say that the things we want may not be very good and proper, but just that — more than any other group of people in history — we have come to expect those things, almost as a right. This makes the problem an acute one for us. We are very quick to conclude that something is badly broken when we don’t see our wants fulfilled. We are habituated to do so. Yet God has probably not been socialized this way.

In Christian spiritual meditation it is almost universally considered an important mark of spiritual maturity when a person stops relying on anything God gives or does and rests in the mere presence of God himself, whatever shape that experience may take. I would like to reach that level of maturity some day. It would mean that any moment in which God is truly present is, by definition, the total answer to all prayer that is prayer.

If the spiritual masters are right, it helps explain why moments of great struggle and loss, of desert seasons and severe privation or grief, often yield the most profound spiritual growth. In those moments, without anything else to distract us, we discover how we and God are really doing together.

“Yes”, “No” and “Not yet” covers all the bases for keeping a lame God intact and reigning supreme in our consciousness. It let’s us sleep at night, I guess.

Thy kingdom come thy will be done translates to “Do what you want to and don’t mind us” Why pray this at all? I can see God waiting by for us to give him the green light to inact his will. Seems like more useless words for our sake only.

Maybe the God we have defined and pray to is a myth. Maybe we should address this before we do some serious scripture “smoke and mirrors” trying to make the square peg fit into the round hole.

Okay, I’m going to ask.

What you are about to read is a first. Could be a last!

I need to raise at least $100,000 by October 31, 2006 in order to pay the required acceptance fee to the State of Texas to receive our low-income, housing tax credit award, to keep our architects working on our City Walk @ Akard project and to pay down our food supply account at the North Texas Food Bank.

I have resisted the urge since beginning this blog to use it as a promotional fundraising tool for the work I attempt to accomplish.

Actually, I am not giving up on that standard as I make my unusual request.

Let me lay out my thinking.

Lots of people who visit here on a fairly regular basis express strong opinions that people of faith should really play the leading role in ministry and uplift to the poor in our nation. Others express slightly different views, but no one has said that people of faith should not be involved.

Then, there are lots of people who visit this space whose lives may or may not be shaped by faith. I can’t really tell. And, of course, everyone is welcome–we need everyone and every perspective here. Still, folks without faith care a great deal about the plight of the poor and underclass in our country, as well as around the world.

So, let’s all get down to business.

I need to raise $100,000.

Here’s how you can help me do it.

Stop reading.

Write me a check.

Or, if you prefer, reach into your wallet or purse and pull out a $1 or a $5 or a $10 or a $20 or a $50 or a $100 dollar bill and mail it to me right now.

I guarantee that every penny will go toward the fulfillment of our vision for City Walk @ Akard, our housing development in Downtown Dallas designed especially for low-income and homeless persons, and toward paying for food for low-income families.

I believe in the power of grassroots movements.

I don’t think we will be successful over the long haul if we don’t have that kind of involvement and “downward” engagement as we move forward into even larger, more costly and demanding efforts.

So, if you really care about the homeless and the poor in Dallas, send me a contribution.

It doesn’t matter where you live. We need national help to create a model that others can use, adapt and act off of. You can help us build it.

You may or may not care, but every penny given is tax deductible and you will receive a written record of your gift, if you include your address.

I want to see how serious the readers in this blog community are about the poor.

Make your checks payable to Central Dallas Ministries and mail them or your cash donations to:

Larry James’ Urban Daily, Central Dallas Ministries, P. O. Box 710385, Dallas, Texas 75371-0385.

Oh, and one more very important part of my very serious request:

Please forward this post to everyone you know who cares about poverty and real life solutions to its pain and challenge.

I’ll keep you posted on the progress.

By the way, you can read more about both projects by scrolling back in the blog archives or by doing a search of my blog for “Resource Center” and/or “City Walk @ Akard.”

Thanks for considering my direct request to join our team as a contributing partner. Such requests won’t be frequent. However, when I make one, you can know that it is serious and important.

I’m not denying that this has some truth, but it doesn’t seem to be a biblical way of answering it. Biblical writers aren’t ashamed to cry out about God’s absence, about his deaf ears, about his failure to respond to cries.

And yet . . . these are themselves prayers of trust. They are the words of people who have learned that the greatest goal in life isn’t to be happy or healed but to be reliant upon the loving God.

All right, I’ll try to put more of that here later.

I hold this comment — about your daughter’s illness and death — as a sacred trust. Thanks for bringing into this painful valley in your spiritual journey.

I’ve been in that valley. I don’t understand it; nor do I like it. But even as we walked through the valley of the shadow of death we felt this presence (most days) that would not leave us.

Shalom.

Why did God allow my grandmother to endure 5 years of pain in a non-communicative state, an amputated leg due to infection, and an almost-financial family mess just to see it all through when she wanted to go to her heavenly home prior to all that? I don’t know - but I sincerely believe He did and does.