"Prayer Changes Things"

Moving into Psalms Thirteen, we are given a glimpse of a heart that is desperate for God to show up. It is not really known on what occasion that David penned this Psalm, or whether or not it was just a season in his life where he may have felt the joy of the Lord was missing, and therefore felt the need for crying out to God. One thing is for sure, in that he needed to feel God's presence in his life, and he needed to feel God's hand of protection. I can relate to this feeling, and I am sure that we all have at one time or another felt a strong desire to know God was near; not like you don't know that, but it's like, I know that your there God, but right now, I need to feel your presence like never before! The title for this Psalm in my Bible is, "A Prayer for Help"; which unlike a plea for help, prayer is something that takes us into the presence of God; which can really change our outlook on any situation that we face. Speaking from my own personal experience, I have found that there are times when I feel that all hope is lost. These are usually the times when I am focused heavily upon a current situation or circumstance; something that is way beyond my control and is an issue for which there is no humanly obtainable answer for solving. Thinking way to much upon these issues, I find myself being overwhelmed by something which seems impossible to live with any longer, saying, Lord, I really don't know how much longer I can do this! To put this in a way that everyone might be able to accept, it would be like being stuck out in the ocean and having to swim in towards land. You know that God will eventually get you there, but you really wish that it would be now, because you feel as though you are going to drown at any moment; especially if land is no where in sight, because you could be swimming around in circles as far as you know. It is in these times, that the power of prayer matters the most; for through prayer we are taken to a place that is outside of our situation, and into a place where God's presence is all that matters. It's not that our situation has changed through prayer, because there are times when it might, and there are times when it won't; but our heart has changed in God's direction, and being closer to God is really what matters the most. The closer we are to God, the further away we are from discouragement; because I am not talking about just a petition to God, as in a prayer for something you would like God to do, like anything to get you to dry land; but it is a drawing close to Him, and a desire for His presence to surround us, more than the water which we are stuck out in. In this, we not only find the strength to carry on, but we find that He is carrying us through: He is our Lifeboat to bring us safely to the land that we seek...