Faith: When all you can do is pray, that's not a bad thing

“All we can do is pray.”

These are words I have said and heard a million and one times. Usually, this phrase is uttered out of desperation. It is expressed after we have done all that is humanly possible to remedy a dire situation. "All we can do is pray," after we have studied for the test, after we have taken the medicine, undergone surgery, tried every specialist. Our response too often is that as a last resort, “let’s pray”.

In the Christian tradition, faith often is defined as "the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen." Perhaps prayer is the remedy for all dire situations; perhaps our first tack in a battle against sickness, disease, disorder, hatred and war is prayer. True works and faith go in tandem with one another to effect change. But, I am suggesting a starting point of faith in prayer.

A couple of weeks ago, I launched a passionate tirade at a compassionate colleague about what our response should be as faith leaders to specific local and world events. The conversation came after a very spirited dialogue among faith leaders. It dawned on me that prayer is a viable response to vexing and perplexing events. Prayer is more than well wishing and the sending of good vibes. Prayer is the invocation of the divine into our circumstance to effect transformation — formation above and over the circumstance. It is adding super to our natural.

What would it look like if faith leaders modeled coming together in faith, in true belief that God can, is willing and able to bring about transformation in the Earth for good, for justice, for mercy, for plenty, for love’s sake?

I am emboldened to say that this would indeed be a worldwide revolution, a repairing of the Earth, a restoration of the Earth to “good.” And that would be a good thing!

Perhaps at the very least, prayer changes the petitioners and in our transformed state, we change the situation. Renewed in our perspective by the holy, the divine, perhaps we then become transformational. We are invited by holy scriptures to always pray, to always converse with God, to make our request known, to pray without ceasing. We pray out loud, we pray heart-prayers. We pray as a form of rest, restoration and reimagining.

I invite us to pray in faith, faith in God, who is both the source and the object of our faith, we pray for heart change, beginning with our own and then situations to change. May it be true: "All we can do, the best thing we can do is pray."

The Rev.Jennifer Rousseau Cumberbatch is a lover of God in Christ, lover and creator of art, daughter, sister, wife, mother, pastor/teacher, counselor, friend. Doing Good Together is compiled by Interfaith Action of Central Texas, interfaithtexas.org.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Faith: Jennifer Rousseau Cumberbatch on power of prayer