Dear Lord Jesus. Amen.

A few days ago at lunchtime, Micah asked if he could pray before our meal.  Of course we are always overjoyed when either of the boys express an interest in doing so.  His prayer was simply this: "Dear Lord Jesus. Amen."  My first thought after he finished was that his prayer was incomplete.  I mean, he didn't even thank God for the food we were about to eat, much less throw in any extras, like thank you for our family, our home, etc.  Upon further reflection however, I have come to the conclusion that it would benefit most of us to grasp the power in that simple, incomplete prayer. (I'm obviously not saying that Micah does at this point). If we would come to the point of total surrender and total submission to God and allow him to truly rule our hearts as the one and only Lord of our life, if we would put away the idols and false gods (anything that we put before God) that hinder our daily walk with Christ, if we would learn to live by faith in all we do, not leaning upon our own strength or understanding and not trying to simply "follow the rules," but rather completely trusting God to take the worthlessness that we are and to transform us into something truly worthy, totally apart from anything we can do, trusting him to provide our every need and to teach us what real joy and happiness is and to allow us to experience it, yes, if we would just acknowledge him as Lord, there would be no need to pray anything more than: "Dear Lord Jesus. Amen."  Maybe that is a deep analysis of a simple child's prayer, but there is truth to it.  We use the word Lord quite regularly in Christian circles.  More often than not it is used as another name for Jesus, rather than His title and desired role in His relationship with us.  He is the Lord!  "He must increase, but I must decrease" (John 3:30).

Danny