Praying and telling God what is going on in your life is as if a parent could go to watch their child in a ball game and see it not only from the perspective of a spectator in the stands but from the child’s perspective, the coach’s perspective, the other players’ perspectives, an aerial perspective, the ball’s perspective, etc. all simultaneously; and then, when the game is over, enjoy every moment of listening to the child’s account of the game. That’s the way I believe it is in our lives. God already knows what happened, but God loves hearing our account of it—and we often learn something from the review. In the words of the funeral liturgy, God is “ever more ready to hear than we are to pray.” [1]

[1] United Methodist Church, The United Methodist Book of Worship (Nashville, TN: United Methodist Publishing House, 1992), 142.