True prayer is our personal communication with God. Many times, if not most of the time, our prayers occur when we encounter sadness, fear, disappointment and setbacks in our lives that we feel inadequate to overcome. Sometimes our prayers are because we face a need. Other times they are spontaneous thankfulness, expressed in response to life’s events, including the sudden and joyful appreciation of the beauty of nature, or even more personal and profound gratefulness for family, friends and unexpected windfalls. Regardless of our motive, communication with God through prayer is an important facet of our relationship with God and how we navigate the twists and turns of life in a broken world.
In some ways the prayers we learn in youth should have the same foundation as our prayers many decades later. That is, an acknowledgement of God as one to be loved and as one who loves us. However, the journey through life can alter our views as we mature and these stages do change our perceptions of life.
We soon learn, not all our prayers are answered, certainly those that are too self-serving. That is probably a good thing! However, we also learn our supplications can open our hearts to many possibilities and produce outcomes that underwrite spiritual benefits not humanly comprehensible.
As we progress from early manhood through education, job training, military, relationships with women, children, career successes and failures, friends, new and old, relationships with bosses and fellow employees, deaths, births and on and on, we men interpret these differently according to our personal perspective. While there is common ground in life experiences, men and women differ in perspective of these matters. Understanding each other and respecting the spiritual insights of both valuable.
The prayers offered here are not meant to replace the very personal and individual praises and times when we privately beseech God. Simply, the prayers by these men reflect real life experiences relative to each subject or event affecting their lives. How each man’s prayer relates to God and reveals their unique expressions to God are meant to be a way of sharing their joy or pain and their personal insights at a time when they reached out through prayer for praise and guidance.
Because the writers of these prayers have been asked to give deep and meaningful thoughts to what and how they felt at the time of their prayers, related to their subject, we believe their sincere, open, and honest prayers to God can be illuminating and supportive of those readers going through similar events in their lives. Some of the prayers are long and thought provoking; others may be profound in their brevity. In some cases, we trust that speaking from the heart trumps speaking with eloquence. It is hoped that readers will choose to return to these prayers when affected by circumstances similar to those of the writers of these prayers.
The authors of each prayer may only be known by their initials or some reference to their story. Importantly, their prayers are their way of reaching out to God for solace or thanksgiving. Some of those offering their prayers may have reached higher levels of fame and fortune in our society. Others will have lives rich in experiences and are equally important to God, regardless of their station. Many men might question where they are on the spiritual continuum, as compared with other men. However, they all share in the commonality of their faith and this resource is meant to be simply, prayers by men.
