23 “When Moses was forty years old, he decided to visit his own people, the Israelites. 24 He saw one of them being mistreated by an Egyptian, so he went to his defence and avenged him by killing the Egyptian. 25 Moses thought that his own people would realise that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not. 26 The next day Moses came upon two Israelites who were fighting. He tried to reconcile them by saying, ‘Men, you are brothers; why do you want to hurt each other?’
27 “But the man who was mistreating the other pushed Moses aside and said, ‘Who made you ruler and judge over us? 28 Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?’29 When Moses heard this, he fled to Midian, where he settled as a foreigner and had two sons.

This is an extract from Stephen’s speech in the book of Acts 7:

‘Moses thought that his own people would realise that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not’ (25).

It is important to think, and what we think is not necessarily wrong. God has given us the gift of the mind and we are to gratefully use it. But sometimes (often, even?) our thinking is far from correct. Logic takes us in the wrong direction. We find repeatedly that God’s ways are not our ways, and His thoughts are not our thoughts. His ways and thoughts are higher than ours. This is why, as followers of Christ, we should live prayerfully, always seeking the mind of Christ.

‘Trust in the Lord with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways submit to him,
and he will make your paths straight.’ Proverbs 3:5,6.

‘Prayer is both the simplest and most difficult of spiritual practices. We need it, we desire it, it is not actually hard to do—and yet even deeply committed believers can struggle at times with prayerlessness. The reasons we give for this neglect take many forms, but they often boil down to some version of “I’m too busy.” Underneath these rationalizations lies a deeper reason: Our pride continually pulls us toward self-reliance, so we avoid the God-reliance that’s at the very heart of prayer.’ (From an article entitled: ‘The sweet relief of utter dependence’ by Kelli B. Trujillo).

PRAYER: God be in my head and in my understanding.