What Am I Praying For?

Even though one of my favorite passages from the Bible advises me to “pray constantly,” I don’t always remember to pray about everything that is worrying me. When I do pray about something that is making me anxious, I don’t always pray for a specific result. I’m not sure if it is something I learned in Sunday School or just picked up on my own, but I don’t feel right praying for my desired outcome. Instead, my go to prayer is from the Lord’s Prayer:

I usually add my own embellishment, to make sure that I am praying with the right attitude:

Not my will, but thine be done.

Maybe I heard the phrase “be careful what you wish for” so often that I am reluctant to pray for a specific result.

Maybe I am open to accepting that a result that I am not hoping for can work out for the best.

Maybe I understand that my perspective is short-sighted and limited in a way that God’s is not.

Still, there are times when there is only outcome to pray for. That a sick friend will recover. That a family member will do well in surgery. In these situations, I also like to pray for the caregivers:

Guide those that are caring for [friend] to make right decisions and take right actions for [her] care.

When things are really bad, I rely on this passage from Romans 8:26:

We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans.

I don’t even need to know what to pray for, I can just pray and the Holy Spirit will take it from there.