Praying God's words back to Him

One of the things I have not done well is incorporate God's words into my prayers. Don Whitney appears to be doing the church a great service with a new book scheduled to be released in July. The book from the professor of biblical spirituality at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary is titled Praying the Bible. I hope to read it. If I do, I am sure I will benefit from it.

For a change, however, I did pray God's words back to Him today. I am using a Bible reading plan this year that consists of reading from a different genre of Scripture each day of the week. Wednesdays are for Psalms.

Since this is the first Wednesday of 2015, I read Psalms 1 and 2, as called for in the reading plan. Here are the first three verses in the English Standard Version of the first psalm:

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, not sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.

I had not planned on using my Bible reading in prayer this morning. But when I read these first three verses, I began petitioning God. I prayed something like this:

God, please don't let me walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of scoffers, but help me to delight in Your law, in Your Word. And help me meditate on Your law, Your Word, day and night. Please help me to bear fruit and prosper, becoming more like Christ.

May this kind of Scripture-infused prayer be more common in my life. May it be so in all of us who are following Jesus. We can have strong confidence that the prayer that originates with God has power with God.