A millennial at prayer

by Grace Henley, Christian Post Contributor |
Photo: Unsplash/Micah Hallahan

If you're anything like me, you've hit a point or two in your walk of faith where you've come to a dead end. Everything is a mess. There are no words to begin to describe the despair you're going through.

For me, this has been an ongoing struggle. Like so many Millennials out there, I am constantly wracked with the question of whether or not I am making the right choices. The world around us is changing faster than ever, and we are hit with constant questions that all lead to one ever important self-reflection: "Am I really, right now, who I want to be?"

The tension between endless self-love and constant self-improvement is potent to say the least. I am not where I want to be in life. Don't get me wrong, I have a wonderful husband and a healthy, happy son, and much joy. I have friends, and a solid, loving extended family.

But an event happened about a week ago that made me sharply realize that I am not where I want to be career-wise. Again, don't get me wrong, the job I have is absolutely wonderful. I should want this job. This is everything I've always told myself I need from a job. So why do I want something more?

It would be one thing to say 'oh I want to hop, skip, and jump into another career that will be sure to yield me the necessary 50k a year a young professional needs to survive'. But that is not the case – not by a long shot. I want to write. I want to write like I want to breathe. If the Lord took away my eyesight like he did that of the poet John Milton, then I too would dictate and beg someone to write it down for me. I want to get into a career that is extremely hard to break into and even harder to create a stable income for said wonderful husband and happy baby boy.

And because I am thirty, instead I hopped, skipped, and tripped into the pit of despair also known as, "if I don't do it now, I will never do it!"

Said despair consumed me until I was in tears during Church. While everyone else was listening and singing, I was silently crying into my hands. I had so much on my mind, so much fear and anguish and anxiety, that I didn't even know how to ask God to help me. For all the writing I want to do, I was absolutely dumbfounded with how to vocalize to God. How to beg Him for His help, for His guidance, for His wisdom.

Then I remembered something I have known my whole life – God is omniscient—all-knowing. He knows the secret desires of our hearts. He knows the thoughts broiling in my anxiety that I cannot even form into words. And so, I just started praying two words over and over: "You know."

Because God does know. Because He has always known. When I don't know what to pray for, He knows. When I cannot even start to try and explain myself, my sins, my doubts, He already knows. And what a relief that is! He is there. He knows the words I cannot begin to imagine.

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