The secret to praying when you don’t know how to pray

A pull quote from DaySpring contributing writer Rachel Marie Kang that reads,

I open the closet door in a room that is not my own. 
 
I put packages of diapers on the top shelf, rearranging and restocking them to help my mother who cares for my older brother. I look down at the floor and catch a glimpse of my brother’s shoes. 

A lump forms in my throat and, at once, I’m all choked up because, for the third time this year, my brother is in the hospital. Though I don’t know what to do and I don’t know what to say, the simple sight of his shoes pricks my heart to pause and pray. 

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It's one of the hardest things in the world:  

When someone you love needs help and there’s nothing you can do to save them. Like when a friend’s heart breaks and suddenly there aren’t enough words in all the world. Or when someone you love is diagnosed with cancer and there’s nothing you can do to cure the disease or the pain of living with it. 

Once in college, I joined a volunteer group that served the youth at Topping Avenue in the Bronx. While there, I discovered a secret that changed my life—a lesson I’ve carried with me in and through the seasons of my life. 

Let the littlest things be a prompt to pray.  

Shoes at the door. A picture on the fridge. Mail that arrives with their name on the envelope. Their toothbrush on the bathroom counter. The grocery store you stop in each week where, that one time, you met a stranger who shared her heartbreaking story. 
 
Any little thing can be a prompt to pray. Even, and especially, when you don’t know what or how to pray. The world is heavy and life is busy, and faith is a fuzzy thing that begs more questions than it begets answers. I don’t know why my brother’s story is one of incurable suffering. I don’t know why war wages on, or economies collapse, or bad things happen to unquestionably good people. I don’t know why crime rates climb or how to save our planet from global warming… 

But I know how to whisper words into thin air and hope with all my heart they’re heard. I bet you do, too.

I bless my boys when I see their whimsical drawings on the floor: 
Protect their sense of wonder. Amen. 

I lift up my friend when I scroll past her photo on my phone: 
Fill her heart with peace. Amen. 

I pray for my brother even when I don’t know what to ask: 
Help him in his suffering. Amen. 

Perhaps God’s ear is bent to hear imperfect prayers.  

Perhaps, more than pious prayers offered from pristine pews, it is the one-word prayers, uttered through exhaustion, that God hears best. Perhaps it is the hopeful prayers, inflected with fear, and the desperate prayers, infused with faith, that God hears most. 
 
Perhaps the secret to praying when you don’t know what to say is less about instruction and more about inspiration. Maybe all it takes is looking around to see the people and places that make up your glorious life. A photo isn’t just a photo; it’s a prompt to pray for protection over your loved one. A stop sign isn’t just a stop sign; it’s a signal to whisper the wish that all wars come to cease. 

It must be true, too, that a shoe on the floor of a closet is not just a shoe, but a sign to slow down and pray for the one who has walked one thousand painful miles in it. Saying a prayer prompted by a small, tangible, temporal thing might feel like the least you can do. But what if, by God, it’s the most you could do?

A black and white portrait of DaySpring contributing author Rachel Kang.

Rachel Marie Kang is the author of "Let There Be Art" and "The Matter of Little Losses." She writes in poignant prose on themes of culture, art and faith. Rachel lives in the New York metro with her husband and two sons. Find her work and words at rachelmariekang.com.