I want my first instinct to always be to pray. Before I think. Before I open my mouth. Before I write a response. Before I update my status. Before I answer my phone. Before I respond to someone. When someone is hurting, I want to pray with them and for them immediately in their hearing. When someone tells me about a crisis, a sad story, or frustration, I want to pray with them rather than just yakking on and on. The old lines of the hymn that my teenage friends and I usde to sing in exaggerated southern drawls on the next to back row, “Are you weary? Are you brokenhearted? Tell it to Jesus. Tell it to Jesus.” didn’t mean what it should have when we were young and beautiful and healthy and there were three tv stations and our world was a very small, very simple place. We were naive and ungrateful and silly and self centered. Pray. I secretly admired Mrs. Pettis who would pray so fervently, so directly, so deeply that I knew the Spirit filled that place. She must have been in her 70’s or 80’s and had a giant steel gray helmet of Texas Big Hair that would have deflected any arrows of darkness and a powerful pioneer’s body with a mighty love for Jesus and an even bigger voice she was never afraid to use. I knew my word was PRAY in January but I didn’t realize until today just why I picked it. Mrs. Pettis. I never saw her again after high school. We moved. I’m not sure I ever even spoke to her or if she knew my name. You never know who is reading your Bible. I read Mrs. Pettis’ Bible all the way on that next to back row on Sunday and Wednesday nights.