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God, my homey

By Daniel Francis

I’ve always treated God as a benevolent and almighty being that must always have our full respect. This was the thinking that I was brought up with. When I prayed to God, I would not say I prayed in an uptight way, but I felt the need to pray to Him as though He was an authority figure.
This means I was always very formal with my language in conversations with Him. Maybe this explains why there was a period when prayer was a bit difficult for me.

A few years back I had a very interesting conversation with a friend that changed all this. One day, I overheard her praying to God and I was a bit shellshocked by what I heard. The prayer was like a casual conversation with a close friend. At the time, I was naively concerned for her because I believed that you had to pray to God in a particular manner.

I asked her why she spoke to God in that manner. Her reply would challenge the way I saw my relationship with God. She explained that this was always how she spoke to God. She spoke to God as she would to any good friend.

She said this helped her to connect with God more naturally and she felt less pressure when she came to Him in prayer. I loved the premise of what she was saying so I began similarly talking to God as a friend.
The first couple of times praying and speaking to God in that way felt uncomfortable. It was like speaking to a teacher after you graduated and calling them by their first name.

However, as time passed, I became more and more comfortable speaking to Him more casually. Honestly, it made me want to come to God in prayer more often. I felt more like myself when I spoke to Him. The lightening of my approach to prayer had deepened my relationship with God. Go figure!
As a result, I found myself praying throughout the day. I would, for example, casually lift up my work to God, pray for persons who looked like they were having a bad day, and even pray for a specific parking spot.

The frequency at which I was in conversation with God increased greatly all because of my approach. It made me wonder how many of us are trying to build a relationship with God with a strict mindset that holds us back from connecting on a deeper level.
It is written in the Bible, “In all your prayer and entreaty keep praying in the Spirit on every possible occasion. Never get tired of staying awake to pray for all God’s holy people” (Eph 6:18).

So going to Him in prayer more often is a good thing that should be encouraged. I sometimes feel guilty coming to God only when I need something. I brought this up in an earlier article but when God is my homey and we are in conversation constantly, there is this decreased feeling that I am only coming to Him when I am in peril.
Maybe now is the time to try a new approach to prayer if you are not already doing this.

Daniel Francis is a millennial helping other millennials. He is a two-time author of the books The Millennial Mind and The Millennial Experience, and an entrepreneur. Over the past four years, he has served as a Personal Development Coach whose work targets Millennials and helps them tap into their full potential. He is also a Self-publishing coach and has guided hundreds on self-publishing their book successfully.

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Email: themillennialmind2020@gmail.com
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