Is Prayer a priority to us?

Yes, I am still on the prayer topic. Do you ever get stuck on a specific topic or subject for awhile? As you can tell, I do. I think what I love so much about prayer is the intimacy it gives us with our Lord Jesus. It is a personal time with just you and Jesus. It is a private time between you and Jesus. You do not have to speak in front of anyone, or feel awkward in front of anyone because your words do not flow as smoothly as others. It is just you and Jesus. That's what I love about my time in prayer.
So I have that point explained. Now how about how often do we pray, how much time do we allow ourselves to pray, and are we rushed? That brings me to this weeks point about prayer and what I've learned in my study time. 
We need to have a scheduled prayer time. Did I just say scheduled? Yes I did.
Face it, unless we have a schedule for our daily tasks or events, most of the time we will forget something. Or we will be too busy, making us rushed in our prayer time. That is how we are these days. We have so many things to do in our given 24 hours that often we put prayer on the bottom of the list.
Think about it, prayer is that given time that we can spend alone with our Savior. It is the time we can talk to Jesus about anything that is on our hearts. And it is the time we can sit and listen to Jesus talk to us. Oh my goodness, there is no greater "scheduled event" in my book.  This is my time with Jesus.
OK, you get my idea here, how important our prayer time is. So if it is that important why do we have it at the bottom of our list? Because we are too busy. We need to learn to say no at times to different things.
In Psalm 55:17 David tells us he calls on the Lord morning, noon, and evening.  Daniel prayed routinely 3 times a day, even when it was dangerous for him to do so.
And in the books of Mark and Luke we read how Jesus rose early in the morning to spend time in prayer.
These were scheduled prayer times. They all knew it was important to set aside a specific time of their day to pray. Otherwise the business of the day would probably get in the way.
I can almost hear your thoughts now, how in the world can I fit prayer into my day 3 times when I can hardly do 1 time. This day and age I'd dare say most of us cannot. But we can set aside time in the morning, or time during the day, or time in the evening before bedtime. I realize not all of us may have an hour to sit and pray. We may not even have half an hour. But what we do have is strategy. Make your schedule work for you. Choose your time. If you need to break it up choose your 2 or 3 times a day that you can pray for a few minutes. We do not have to be rigid in our length of time.
I do not want you to feel badly about yourself if you haven't been able to figure your time out. But I want this to encourage you, use your own strategy as to what works best for you.
Most of all what I want you to realize is how much Jesus wants that "alone time" with you. He loves to have those conversations with you. He loves to hear your voice.
The Lord Jesus Christ wants to spend time with us. How awesome is this?!!
Be encouraged faithful readers, I am confident you will find your time, you will work it out for your schedule. Treasure your time with Jesus.