“To form a habit of conversing with God continually, and referring all we do to Him, we must first apply to Him with some diligence…”

-Brother Lawrence, in The Practice of the Presence of God

~

CLOSER: The “One Word” I chose as my year’s goal, to draw and stay closer to God my Savior, Christ my Lord.

C-L-O-S-E-R: The letters as an acronym, or acrostic, each letter standing for a guide word, a help to drawing near.

Call: Good guide word for C to stand for.

And lately glimpsing C-L-O-S-E-R without its first letter, I saw what comes of leaving out the “call.” 

C-L-O-S-E-R without the C is… LOSER. And that’s what I will be! Losing so much blessing.

Call.

Call to Him.

Call out to Him.

Or quietly call on Him in gentle, trusting approach.

But call. on. Him.

We all need to.

Because we all need His power to work in us.

We are weak. And we need to know we’re weak, need to admit it humbly before Him.

Blessed are the poverty-stricken in spirit.

Blessed are the destitute of soul, the beggars of God’s grace.

We do not know how to draw near.

We do not even know how to pray.

Sometimes we don’t even know how to begin by calling.

But His Spirit helps us in this weakness, too. His word helps us voice our heart, gives us His words to put in our mouths. So we can pray a call totally according to His word, His will, His Spirit — thus, a confidant call!

How to call upon the LORD?

Look at all the calls He gives us! (Below: Not an exhaustive list!) We can use any of these scriptures as openings to prayer, or interspersed within it, as we feel need, even as we feel our souls recede and start to stray. We need His power to help us keep clinging close as well as initially to draw near.

Notice how different some of the cries are and what they call for, how they express such varied needs, at various times of the day, or night.

(Hover your cursor and the scripture passage will appear in the NKJV. To read it in a different version, click on the reference and it will appear in its context at BlueLetterBible.org. Scroll to the top of the page there and click “Change version,” and then your choice. Or use your favorite Bible, opened to Psalms.)

Psalm 4:1

Ps 5:1-3

Ps 6:1-4

Ps 12:1

Ps 16:1-2

Ps 17:1,6

Ps 25:1-2,4-5

Ps 26:1-2

Ps 28:1-2

Ps 31:1-3

Ps 38:1,4,15,21-22

Ps 39:4,7,12

Ps 43:1,3

Ps 51:1-2

Ps 54:1-2

Ps 55:1-2

Ps 57:1-2

Ps 61:1-2

Ps 62:1 (A silent, waiting call)

Ps  63:1-2

Ps  64:1

Ps  69:1-3,16-18

Ps 70:1

Ps 71:1-5

Ps 80:1,17-19

Ps 86:1,6-7

Ps 88:1-2

Ps 102:1-2 (See Ps 102:17-20)

Ps 116:1-2

Psalm 119 is loaded with calls, scattered throughout.

Ps 120:1-2

Ps 121:1-2

Ps 123:1-3

Ps 130:1-2

Ps 141:1-4

Ps 142:1-2

Ps 143:1

(Feel free to copy the list for your own use.)

*****

Linked to