I’ve been feeling a little overwhelmed this week with stuff. As a result, I haven’t had the energy or time to follow through on posts I’ve been wanting and promising to write [sorry!]. Yesterday, I came home feeling stressed. It’s a strange feeling because my threshold for stress is very high. I rarely get rattled. It’s good to have this sense of stability but if I’m not careful, it leads to my biggest personal struggle: my pride and self-reliance. Confidence is good; self-reliance or rather, unreliance on God is my path to isolation and exhaustion.
Yesterday, I was especially feeling overwhelmed with stuff: trying to care for people stuff; church stuff; interviewing people stuff; QCafe stuff; need to feed three kids stuff; need to sell the home stuff; humanitarian organization stuff; wanting to fly to Myanmar stuff [if they were issuing visas!]; getting ready to head to Asia for our sabbatical stuff; getting ready to host several guests at our home stuff, getting ready for important meetings stuff; and other stuff.
Lots of stuff.
My wife, Minhee, sat me down last night, held my hands and just prayed. It was so good for the soul. We prayed for many things but if there was a phrase that kept echoing in my heart, it was:
“Lord, guide us…”
That’s exactly what I needed to hear and pray.
Question for YOU:
If you could summarize your prayers to a short phrase, what would it be?
I know there’s many who read the blog but don’t comment. It would be great to hear from everyone [and encouraging to one another] to share how you are seeking and praying.
EUGENE CHO 
Lately, my prayer has been, “Change my heart, O Lord.”
I’m praying trough the psalms, finding just one sentence or word each day in the spesific psalms that I will pray over. Today it was “You are not a God who takes pleasure in evil;” from Psallm 5.
Use me, O Lord, for your glory and honor.
Use me.
your kingdom come, your will be done…..
help me be a better husband, father, and person
come Holy Spirit
Hang in there PE.
I’ll be praying for you.
Eugene. Thanks for this piece, it hit home pretty hard for me. first of all, stress has been heavy on me lately. my wife and i just moved for the third time since we were married in august and between transition (again), a new position with a new ministry, being new to marriage…the list could go on…it just seems like even with good things it can feel like so much is going wrong. I personally can really struggle with feelings of inadequacy and yes, pride can be too much for me as well. I am not a control freak when it comes to myself and others, but with God I can be. I ask myself in a state of realization, “what the crap did I do that for?”. Not that it’s about the easy way out in life, but honestly, that is what God wants for us, right? To make things easier because of our reliance on Him…to me, ‘healthy relationship’ and ‘reliance’ are synonymous. I realize that my issue is in my self-expectancies of earning. So far from how God thinks, huh? This is a habitual thing for me and only God and my reliance on Him will take care of it. I expect too much from myself and have this sense that I need to prove myself, i think this shuts the door on grace. Anyways, my prayer needs to be “let go, erick. let go.” thanks for letting me ponder out loud, i’m feeling a little mashed up today.
Lord, teach me what it means to rely on you…
My prayers this year (so far) have gone something like this: “Yes, Lord. Yes, I agree. I know this is true. What do I do now? How…..?” Thanks for your honest post. I really appreciate your blog (which I am new to). I’ll be praying for your upcoming trip.
Lord, I want to be more like YOU.
Lord lead me
&
Lord teach me,
…change my mind & understanding.
Please help me to want what YOU want.
Where are You? (Help me see)
Eugene,
I’m not a Christian anymore – I think – but have been lurking on your blog for awhile now. It’s given me much to be hopeful about as I find the courage to one day return to faith.
Help my unbelief. I want to know you.
Great post Eugene! Your transparency is a light…
My prayer lately has been simple. “Please show me what you’re doing today, Jesus.”
@everyone. thanks everyone for sharing and look forward to hearing from others.
@smileforjc: good to hear from you. look forward to crossing paths in asia soon.
@erick: wow. thanks for sharing that.
P.E., come to think of it, u sounded tired on the phone the other day – more tired than us and we’ve been rocked pretty hard lately. But things are going to take an upturn this summer. Everything will be ok…
For the past few years mine has sounded something like, “Free me from fear, fill me with love.”
Jesus save me.
Sounds Sunday-school-ish but seriously … my biggest problems the past few years of college have been the polar opposite to what yours are. Self reliance and overconfidence? I wish. Self doubt and overanxious-ness? Yeah … been a good learning trip though.
More details on that on my blog.
honestly, when i get so exhausted from trying to do too much, and don’t think i can keep up with it all, when i feel like i’m failing or falling, when i feel afraid or alone and just don’t know what i should be doing with my life, i pray the same prayer:
“jesus”
not very fancy, but that’s it.
Break Me and Recreate Me!
My prayer will be “LET THY WILL BE DONE”
“the joy of the Lord is my strength…”
“Lord, help me and teach me.”
“In Your Presence is fullness of Joy”
help me to be all that You’ve created me to be
i need you
I pray first for wisdom, then for courage. The first is useless without the second.
i guess it’s a prayer:
um, hello? are you real?
Mine: “Lord, help!”
My sister’s (for over a year): “God, I need a job”
I’m with Theresa and PVSanker… Thy will be done
Lord, be gentle with me because I am so weak.
or
Let not my need for or lack of your perfect understanding/wisdom, keep me from moving.
less of me, more of You
“Help me to trust that those who mourn will be comforted…”
lately, my word has been “let”. it covers my life as a child of God quite well, especially as i continue to begin to understand submission (there’s that nasty word again, PE!), grace, forgiveness and peace.
lord, help me make it home ok. ( thats what i say every night now. )