So I have been in the church from the time I was born. I have been in church at least 3 days a week for the entirety of my life. There have been times where I have completely believed in God and there have been times when I have seriously questioned faith and whether He was really there. Prayer in many denominations has become a ritual. Even in our "free-spirited" Pentecostal churches, we have created formula's and ways to pray. Whether you are saying your Hail Mary's or whether you are reciting from a prayer book, or whether you are following the ACTS (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication) formula, we have all in many ways ritualized prayer. So today I was sitting down before breakfast and I had a lot on my mind. I took a moment, closed my eyes and began to pray. This is what went through my mind. "God I'm sorry for not spending enough time...wait that's to condemning...", start over, "God can you help me to feel better"....wait to needy, to presumptuous....", start over, I took a breath and realized wow I've got a prayer for everything. I have made my own ritual. So then I simply said "God I need you..." then... there was peace. We over think prayer. Its talking to a  person, and we ritualize it because we don't want to get personal with God. Getting personal with God is scary, it comes with our open book of bad and good. We have to be honest. We can't hide behind the prayers we have always prayed. Real prayer, real talking to God requires confession and listening.  Two things that are hard for most people. To prideful to confess and to impatient to listen...that's me anyway. So even now as I'm writing this I have a desire to go get on my knees, because the reality is prayer is not always the same, its not always a ritual, it comes out of a person to person relationship with God. You can go to church and say a couple prayers and sing some songs and get nothing out of it, but if you honestly just go someplace, get alone, and talk to God without presumption or ritual, just honestly before Him, YOU WILL MEET HIM. He will be there. No matter how you feel, no matter what your circumstance, no matter what your need, He will be there. Just go as you are. One of my favorite things about the bible is  not that it has all these perfect stories and perfect anecdotes. It is a book of truth and each of the authors were honest with God. Especially David, in the psalms he got angry, he danced, he cried, he tore his clothes, he was frustrated, he suffered loss, you name it he faced it. My favorite thing about him was that he was honest in prayer with God and because of that...he was a man after God's own heart. Not necessarily because of the stuff he did because he did some bad stuff, but because he was honest with God. When we are in that place with God, he can speak and we can listen and we can change. I have to take ritual out of my prayer life and I hope for those who read this today that you can evaluate your own relationship with God and see the areas that perhaps you have made more about you then about Him. Oh and Happy Thanksgiving!!! I hope everyone had a great day :)