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How Do I Pray?

I don’t know how to pray.
God has given what we’ve asked for.

Fires in California

The sun rises and sets red.
Ash settles over everything, giving a false feeling of snow, even as it remains in the 90’s.
A smoke haze fills the air, resembling thick fog.
That wood-burning smell permeates even clothes.
The night brings a hazy fog of its own, much darker without the moon and stars’ lights.
Like Mordor, in The Lord of the Rings, always night-time, never day.
The drudgery of the day’s task heavy as the sun is not seen.

How do I pray? 
I struggle to know how. 
Why? You ask.

These fires, though supposedly started by lightning, spread because of our state’s environmental policies. Legislation  does not allow any clearance of the underbrush.
Where once sheep and cows grazed the brush, now, the underbrush has grown creating a tinderbox for any spark. 
Lumber cannot be harvested nor fallen trees removed, resulting in overcrowding, disease and frail growth. 
Our legislature has dictated “hands off” policy in state and national parks under the guise of “saving the environment.” 
Firefighters are not allowed to use dirt-moving equipment in the parks to create fire breaks.
Thousands of acres burn while they can do almost nothing.
Firefighters have 0% containment of these fires—until they reach the outer boundaries of these parks. 
Then suddenly “success” and containment. 

So how do we pray when God has given what we’ve asked for?
We haven’t sought His counsel. We haven’t fulfilled His mandate to “have dominion.”
SEE Are You a Protector or a Ruler? We've done what we wanted. And the results are disastrous.

(Side NOTE: How much of these state induced evacuations, forcing non-compliant, “hill” people into towns and cities where control is easier to master, was planned?)

EDUCATION
We wonder at our children who have grown to demand socialism. How can this be?
Look at our educators.
I struggled with my boys in college. 
Their teachers did not care enough to tell their students they weren’t going to be in class.
My boys drove 45 minutes only to find class was cancelled, not once, but several times.
One teacher, when asked to explain a chemistry problem, told my son, “Look on-line, I don’t have time.”

Not only the apathy of these teachers repulsed me, but their viewpoint.
For two decades, educators have propagated the philosophy of “no responsibility.”
One son had to write extensive reports from his textbook Vicious Villains.
When he chose a conservative view point, the teacher told him he couldn’t support his view with enough references.
He already had the three required references.
She argued, “They won’t be good enough for a good grade.”
He had to choose between a good grade and presenting facts.

Even school’s majors reflect this bias—Latino Studies. What kind of job do you use that?
But these majors allow teachers to propagandize their beliefs under a forced audience.

Many of the hard classes, math and science, still require someone who knows truth.
How else can you teach 2 + 2 = 4, without some belief in truth?
But in some classes, even that truth is questioned.
(But thank God, for those Christians who continue to teach!)

What about elementary schools? 
Curriculum and teacher’s biases dictate that boys become less like men to fit into the feminized world.
Genders are slurred, roles demolished, history re-made, gay propaganda pushed in kindergarten and the family is destroyed.

These are the educators teaching our children.
The Teachers Union endorses defunding the police. Should we be surprised?

You think because you are homeschooling you are exempt from this responsibility, after all, you are teaching your children.
What about their spare time? What do they watch? 
It’s tempting to allow the world’s philosophy to seep in through movies, books, and the internet.
I’m guilty of allowing movies I wished later the boys hadn’t watched.
Be diligent and disciplined. 
It’s today’s little choices that determine tomorrow’s opportunities.

How do I pray?
I don’t know how to pray.
For we have received what we’ve asked for.
Parents have willingly relinquished their responsibility to teach their children, not just how to read and write, but how to work and be responsible, to be done by someone else. 
They have forsaken their duty.
And allowed whomever to present their views rather than our beliefs.

What about lunch?
It's no longer the parents’ responsibility to give their child a lunch.
In spite of COVID-19, schools continue providing children with their “free lunches.”
I heard someone discussing how they needed bus drivers to deliver children their lunches during the quarantine. 
At what cost?
Parents have lost our children.
When was the last time your family all sat together for dinner? 
What about God’s command to instruct our children as we walk, work and eat? 
How can we teach when we don’t even sit together for a meal?
Are we even home?
Who teaches our children manners, work-ethics, life?
And we are surprised that no one has table manners or social skills!

How do I pray?
When we have received what we allowed.

MEDICAL TREATMENT
Mothers use to address her family’s medical issues. Herbal remedies were necessary. Colds and flues were treated with chicken-noodle soup, juice and rest.

Of course the medical field was consulted on more important issues and even a second opinion requested, if desired, but the result still lay in the parents’ hands to dictate what their family received.
But as schools dictated vaccines, parents hands were slowly emptied of what they were required to do.
As schools became more controlled by the government rather than the parents, government became more restrictive and demanding in our children’s health. 
As government took over the parent’s role for caring for the children, they also paid for their medical care. 
Parents were pleased to allow the government to pay. 

How do I pray?
When we have gotten what we asked for?
Government has indeed taken over our health.
Obama Care was created to enable everyone to get free medical care.
But they forgot to tell you, who they would treat and who they would not treat. 
Everyone does not mean everyone. 
Unwanted babies are left to die. 
So are our elderly.
Everyone is herded into a COVID unit in my son’s hospital, even if their symptoms do not warrant them. 
More stories reveal government’s lies and cruelty.

But we are at fault.
We have allowed the government to do what is our responsibility.

How do I pray?
We have received what we asked for.

How do I pray?
Our God is truth.
I ask He remove the blinds that keep our people deceived and unable to see our own wrong.
Our God is slow to anger and forgiving.
I ask Him to withhold His righteous justice and grant repentance.
We have ignored His Law, forsaken His Way, and done our own thing in all things, but
Our God is merciful. 
I ask Him to show mercy.
Our God is sovereign.
I ask for His perfect will to be done.
Our God is strength.
I ask for His strength for what we must face because of our decisions.
Our God is love.
I know He will make all these things good.

Pray?
Not sure how. 
But I tell God anyway.
He will make all things right.


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Author of Biblical fiction, married to my best friend, and challenged by eight sons’ growing pains as I write about what matters.

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