“One should never initiate anything that he cannot saturate with prayer.” ~ Unknown
There is a line in a Robert Burns’ poem, To a Mouse, that has been slighted reworked to state, “The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” I know many people — I being one of them — who recite that quote when something that I planned, and planned quite well, I might add, falls apart. It is a reminder to us that we cannot always plan outcomes, that we cannot see outside variables.
However, it is not always the outside variable that thwart our plans. Sometimes, our plans are a non-starter from the very beginning because we did not have everything that we needed to begin with. I would mention, as a quick example, the time a friend and I went for a drive downstate to attend a conference. Our journey never made it past Lowell as, on I-65, my friend’s car stopped. He had forgotten to fill the gas tank before picking me up.
We have made several plans for ourselves this Lent. Our plans might be quite simple or our plans might be relatively complex. Our plans, though, no matter how simple or complex, will be non-starters if we do not fuel the tank.
Our fuel is prayer. If we do not underlie every one of our plans with prayer, we are going to fail. We will stop short because we will not have the grace that we need to continue to successful completion.
A commercial that was around when many of us were growing up asked us, “Have you had your Wheaties today?” Before setting out into our day, we need to ask ourselves, “Have we said our daily prayers today?”
FAITH ACTION: Make sure that you take the time to prayer throughout your day.