“The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears, and rescues them from all their troubles.” (Psalm 34:17 CSB)
Devotional
I don’t cry out to God as often as I assume I do. Most of the time, when something is wrong, my first move is to think it through, plan around it, mention it to someone else, or just quietly worry, long before it occurs to me to actually cry out to him about it.
This verse doesn’t describe the composed, well worded prayer we usually think prayer is supposed to be. Cry out is raw, urgent, the kind of sound that comes out before we’ve had a chance to organize it into proper sentences. Let’s figure out together what that tells us about God. He isn’t waiting for polished requests before he responds. He is listening for the actual cry, however unformed it is.
We sometimes hold off praying about something until we can articulate it properly, as if God is more likely to respond to a well composed request than a raw one. This verse suggests exactly the opposite is true. It is the cry itself that reaches him, not the quality of its wording.
What changes, practically, is that the next hard thing doesn’t need to wait for us to find the right words. The unformed version, the version we’d never say out loud in front of anyone else, is exactly what he’s listening for.
God is close enough to hear an unformed cry. He does not require a formal one to actually respond.
Reflection
I notice I often wait to pray about something until I’ve figured out how to say it properly, which usually means I wait longer than I need to. I want to bring God the raw version more often, the one that doesn’t sound composed or spiritual yet. This verse tells me that’s actually what he’s listening for. I don’t need to clean it up first.
Prayer
Father, thank you that you hear the raw cry, not just the polished prayer. Forgive us for waiting until we’ve found the right words before bringing something to you. We cry out to you now, in whatever form it comes in. Thank you for rescuing us from real trouble, not just responding to well phrased requests.