I can demonstrate for school prayer and public prayer, open every church and sunday school class with prayer, write and read books and blogs on prayer, preach on prayer, hold classes on prayer, attend conferences on prayer, feel rightious indignation when laws are passed involving restricting public prayer, and never once truelly pray with Him alone. Never once.

The casual clear crisp recitation-style of public prayer dies at the door of one's prayer closet. The manipulative preachments of public 'prayings' are revealed for what they are. And the struggle begins.

For, a struggle it is. There are none so 'spiritually mature' for whom it is not. But to evade the struggle is to evade the Prize and the glory of "praying through" (by any other name).

We are all so satisfied with so very little in Him, by convincing ourselves that what we have is so very much. Evading the strugglings. Evading the Prize of His most singular Presence.

Pray for His Greater Blessing in our lives! Pray for a HUNGER for Prayer!

So much of "my love for Him" is little more than sporadic infatuation. It rarely costs me a thing. I seek His priceless blessings with dime-store prayers and cut-rate commitment that costs nothing, changes nothing, and isn't worth a penny more. Seeking a costless revival where repentance is a sinner's duty. Surely not mine, Lord. Surely not mine.

My love for Him is a selective thing. A picking and choosing of what I will do and what I will not. What I shall give and what I shall withhold. This oh so comfortable thing I call "loving Him". Yet He calls such "love" no love at all. My lukewarm selective obediance betrays my words and makes my love a lie.

If today I stood before Him, as I shall on that day of days, all my well-rehursed auditorium love for an auditorium Lord won't do. My half-hearted subjective and token obediance won't impress Him. How can He pour through me when I am yet so full of myself? Presuming, if it satisfies me, it satisfies Him?

Do I love Him?

The words come so easily. They roll right off my tongue. "Surely thou knowest that I love thee, Lord."

Then why is He asking again?