The First, Middle, and Last Thing to Do

Here's the second late blog post. Since it was so short, especially compared to the other late blog post, I decided to add a bit to it just before posting it.

In April, 2004, President Henry B. Eyring said “The first, middle, and last thing to do is to pray.” 

I have no trouble at all praying after something is done, either to thank God for the experience or for helping me get through it, and I don’t often have trouble praying when I’m in the middle of something and things are going badly, but the reason I so often get to that point may be because I frequently forget to pray for guidance before I start trying to do something.

How much time do I waste trying to do things my way before asking how God would like me to proceed? How many times would God have gladly helped me, but I forgot to ask for His help, perhaps because I thought I woulnd’t need it? How often do I wait until things get bad before I ask God to help me? Wouldn’t it be a lot wiser to pray for help before I badly need it?

Recently (and I mean recently as of May 15, 2015), I made a goal to pray before studying, hoping that the Spirit would guide me to study the right things and would help me remember the things that I studied. However, the thing that I consistently fail to remember is to actually pray before studying. Maybe I should pray and ask God to help me remember to pray.

Things really go so much better when we have God's help in doing them, and God's willing to grant His help more often than we might think. We just need to remember to ask for it, preferably before we mess things up.