If you’re anything like me, most days you spend so much time taking care of and praying for others that you forget to take care of and pray for yourself. Then you have that one moment where you feel overwhelmed, lost and alone, and you realize how important it is to pray for yourself, especially your strength. Today, join me in saying a prayer for inner strength.

Dear Heavenly Father,

Thank you for this day, and thank you for your many blessings.

Lord, today I am tired. As much as I try not to complain, I don’t feel like being everything to everybody. I don’t want to put anyone else’s needs before my own. I want to be selfish. Lord, I’m frustrated, I’m discouraged, and I just don’t feel like I have the mental energy to deal with anything or anybody right now. Everything in me wants to revert to some of my old behaviors rather than being the new creature in Christ you want me to be.

Today, Lord, I need your strength. Help me to make good choices. Help me to do the things you would have me to do, say the things you would have me to say and be the person you want me to be this day. I need your comforting reassurance sooner than right now that I am not alone. I need to know that while I’m busy looking out and praying for others that someone somewhere is busy looking out and praying for me. Help me to see in this very moment that even though life has me feeling overwhelmed, even though things seem dark and dreary, the Son is still shining.

Give me a strength right now that exceeds my circumstances. Help me not to yield to temptation. Help me to remember 1 Corinthians 10:13, that the temptations in my life are no different from what others experience. And that you are faithful. Help me to remember that you will not allow the temptations that are placed upon me to be more than I can stand. Help me during this moment when I am feeling tempted, when I am feeling hopeless, when I am feeling like all is lost to remember that you will show me a way out so that I can endure.

Lord, I thank you for who you are and for whose I am. I thank you that even in this moment of feeling weak, you are giving me strength. I thank you that just like it says in Philippians 4:13, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. It’s in Jesus’ name that I pray. Amen.