Chris' prayer: Mary Mary's "Shackles (Praise You)"

Take the shackles off my feet so I can dance
I just wanna praise you

This song, and specifically these lines, describe perfectly my last adoration experience. I wanted to praise God, to sing to Him and worship Him, but I felt bound by my thoughts, my wandering mind, and never really did get to do what I was so looking forward to doing. I felt so handicapped by my own brain, my heart aching to cry out to my Maker, locked up. I just kept waiting for those next lines to come:

You broke the chains now I can lift my hands
And I'm gonna praise you

I'm still waiting...


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Megan's prayer: Mary Mary's "Shackles (Praise You)"

But I need you to lift this load
Cause I can't take it anymore

Sometimes the load does get heavy. Sometimes I feel like it is too much to handle, but at the same time, I end up feeling that it is too insignificant to take it to others, to take it to God. It *should* be something that I can handle myself.

It's hard to do, but many times it is necessary to just let go and let God take care of it. To finally realize that this load is not my load to carry. It's hard to do, but each time I am able to do it, I am left with such a sense of peace, and I wonder why I didn't just take it to God from the beginning.

Erinnicole's Prayer: Mary-Mary's "Shackles: Praise You"

Take the shackles off my feet so I can dance

How often do i ask God to take the "shackles" off of my feet so that I can start over running the wrong direction once more? I think the answer, sadly, is too often. The moment I am free from one problem, I let God go back to doing His thing and get right back to running the wrong way. But this is an excellent solution to that problem! When He takes the shackles off, praise Him! Dance! Thank God that we have the ability and the freedom to ask for His help in the first place and more so the fact that He openly gives it!

Catie's prayer: Mary Mary's "Shackles (Praise You)"

In the majority of this school year for bible study we have been talking about how we can make ourselves better women of God and just over all better people in general. We've been talking about this and how we can help the people around us become better people as well. My bible study leader gave us this quote last night, "Father, make of me a crisis man. Bring those I contact to decision. Let me not be a milepost on a single road; make me a fork, that men must turn one way or another on facing Christ in me. " This is saying that when people come to us, they are going to have to make a choice of whether or not to follow Christ because we are living out how he wants us to live that well. When we do this, as we ourselves grow into the people God want us to be and help the others around us as well, I think think that is no better way of saying to God-

I just wanna praise you

What better way to praise God than through our very lives, our very being. When we do God's will for us and live as he wants us to, there are few things that honor and praise him more.