James 5:13
13 Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is anyone happy? Let him sing songs of praise.

In one simple verse, James outlines the two ways we use prayer in our daily lives–either as requests for aid or as praise for requests answered.

Most of us likely do a lot of the “praying while in trouble;” I certainly do (especially while in traffic!). In fact, that’s how praying is viewed even by non-Christians…it’s something that is done as a last resort, when it seems nothing else will work. It’s also seen as something foolish to do, or something that weak or non-rational people do, at least in pop culture. Even Christians sometimes have trouble praying when it seems there’s “nothing to pray about,” i.e., no illness or trouble to ask God for help about.

But our prayers do serve another purpose beyond that. We can also pray when we are happy, as James depicts here; our words can be “songs of praise” to God, not only for what He’s done for us, but for Who He is. If we took time every day in prayer to affirm that God is Almighty and has everything under control, how much less stressed might we be? How much less worry might we have? It’s worth thinking about, and worth praying about.

Prayer isn’t just an “In Case of Emergency” type of communication with God; it can be our daily phone call to God, a chance to catch up and talk, to tell Him how much He means to us. And if that sounds like a silly thing to do, then consider this: if the only time your family members called you was to ask you for something, how strongly would you say they valued their connection with you? Our connection to God should be considered the same way–He is our Father, after all.