Leaning on Prayer to Get Me Through the Day

A friend of mine once told me that he started each day praying before his feet hit the floor in the morning. My friend shared that he prayed something simple like “Lord, thank You for a good night’s rest. May everything I think, say, and do today glorify You.” Nothing fancy. Nothing long or verbose. This helped him calibrate his day. He remembered whose he was and he remembered his why—his reason for living every day.

Over the years, I’ve leaned on two prayers a lot. While I’m positive I’ve missed praying one or both of them here and there, they are a part of my regular prayer life more often than not.

Praying them doesn’t yield any magical results. That’s not what prayer is and it’s not what prayer does. Prayer is a conversation between us and God. Most days, this connectivity is something I need to survive the daily battle of what it means to be human. High highs, low lows. Joy and celebration one moment; grieving and mourning the next. Through prayer, I remember that I’m not alone.

The first prayer I pray is the Lord’s Prayer. Its verses contain everything I need to pray. It’s how Jesus taught His disciples how to pray.

“Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

Matthew 6:9-13

The second prayer I pray is the Serenity Prayer. It reminds me of where I come from and of the miracles God performed to get me here. And that I need Him to get me through the day.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Reinhold Niebuhr

Do you have a morning prayer routine that you follow? Are there prayers that you lean on to get you through the day?

Another friend once told me, “Remember, Rainer, you can start your day over any time you wish and as often as you need to. There’s no reason to wallow in a bad day. Just start over.”

Rainer is a visual artist, minister, and blogger-in-chief at The Devotional Guy™. Since committing his life to Jesus in 2007, Rainer has had the privilege of teaching, preaching, and ministering in many different outlets throughout the Dallas-Fort Worth community as well as other regions of Texas.