“In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans” (Romans 8:26).
I know, that you know, praying is important. We all get it. But the thing is, praying is hard. Sometimes we don’t know what to pray. We don’t know how to pray. We don’t know what to say. Or we end up saying the same thing over and over.
There was a time when I was dealing with depression. I didn’t want to be around anyone. I didn’t even want to open my curtains. I wanted to be alone. I wanted to run away. I didn’t know where…just not here.
When I found myself in that dark place, I didn’t want to pray. Actually, it wasn’t so much I didn’t want to pray as much as I didn’t know what to say. I knew God was the key to getting out of that darkness. I knew I was wrong. I knew I had sinned. I knew I had gotten myself into that dark place.
This is where liturgy and the psalms are such an important part of our spiritual practices. Psalms are prayers. A third of the psalms are laments. When you don’t have words to pray, pray the psalms. Read the psalms and pray those words as if they were your words.
When I found myself in that dark place, it was psalms that provided the words for the prayers I needed. The second thing that helped me was liturgy. When I didn’t know what to say, I prayed the breath prayer, “Lord have mercy on me…a sinner.”
The way breath prayers work is to pray “Lord have mercy on me” as you breathe in, and pray “a sinner” as you breathe out. I prayed that for hours, for days, for weeks.
Then it happened. In time, the darkness didn’t seem so dark anymore. And the more I prayed, the more the darkness retreated.
God gives us the Holy Spirit to pray for us when we don’t even have the words to articulate what’s going on in us. When that happens, get in the psalms. Let the words of the psalms provide you with the language of prayer when you’ve run out of words.
Praxis: Faith in Action 