Folded or Wadded

When you pull a tissue from the Kleenex box, do you fold or do you wad?

When you use the toilet paper in the bathroom…fold or wad?

The other day, my husband had used some tissue and so had I. When I went to throw mine away, I noticed my wadded up mess next to his nicely folded tissue. If you knew his personality versus my personality, the folded versus the wadded would make a lot of sense.

Prayer is kind like this…wadded versus folded.

Some approach prayer in a nicely folded fashion and some approach prayer all wadded up.

So, which one is right?

Well, both actually.

Recently in my small group of wonderful ladies, we have been studying prayer. As I have surveyed the room, I have heard each woman speak a little differently to prayer. But I sense most of us want to take the folded up way to prayer.

But I have had to be honest with myself…I have a wadded up approach to prayer no matter how hard I try. I have tried and even taught the organized approach. I have made lists, made notes on those lists, followed the ACTS acrostic approach to prayer but every time I think I am organized in my prayer life, my organization crumbles. I forget to update the prayer list causing grandma’s broken leg to still be broken years after I put her on the prayer list. I have felt guilty and have felt as though I have the worst prayer life of anyone.

Then I watch my folded up husband. He has lists and lists of lists. He is organized and persistent. There are people on his prayer list he has prayed for for years and consistently so. When he learns of someone receiving Christ, he can rejoice because he has them on his list and has consistently prayed for them.

During this study on prayer, one of the authors shared that her prayer life is all over the place. She has no lists and no organization. She just prays when something is laid on her heart. She is wadded up and pleased with that.

When I heard her story, I breathed a sigh of relief. I released myself and embraced my wadded up prayer life. I accepted that I could not keep to the list and learned to relax in my spontaneous wads.

When someone asks me to pray…I pray. I just don’t write it down. When God speaks to my heart to pray for someone or something, I pray even if it is in the middle of the night.

I aspire to be folded, but I am much happier wadded.

Whether you are folded or wadded, be happy in who you are and how you pray.

Hebrews 4:16 – Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Written by Melody Westbrook.
Melody Westbrook is the founder of The Walk Ministries, a ministry designed to bring women together through God’s story. She was a pastor’s wife for 35 years and has authored the book The Walk Back to Eden. She is a communicator who loves to tell God’s story written within each of us while using her personal experience of a broken marriage and childhood survivor of abuse to communicate God’s redemption story. She loves teaching real women real stories of real life from God’s word. You can find her at http://facebook.com/thewalk.edw/