Playing Catch-up

I've been trying to catch up on my reading from failing last weeks assignment to read chapters 8 and 9 in "The Jesus I Never Knew." It's a pretty interesting book, and I question my ideas of who Jesus was every time I read it. Chapter 9 in conjunction with what I've been reading in the study "Experiencing God" have had me thinking about how and what I spend my time praying for. I could relate with Yancey's thoughts of God as some great magician or magic genie. This is pretty much how I prayed throughout my childhood and part of me never really grew out of that. Sure, I stopped praying for jet-packs or a super Nintendo, but I'd always end up praying that some miracle would happen because I knew he could do it so why not? Sometimes I would catch myself and think, "well, wishing for personal miracles is kind of selfish" so I would try to reason out how I could somehow prove that God did it and that it would be okay that way. Looking back after reading through this chapter I can't help but feel a little retarded. Even if I could prove to people that I got a jet-pack because God thought it was cool too, it still wouldn't accomplish anything worthwhile. The same can be said for some of the more rational prayers I've had about spontaneous healing. I can't tell you how many times I wanted my knee to not be broken after I ran it into a wall, but what would that have done for the Kingdom? If anything my going through that pain helped me realize again how many people around me care about me and are willing to do what they can if I'm ever in need and the only reason I have those people is because God put them in my life. Now, the funny thing is I'm not sure how to reformat my prayer time so that it will be better spent, or what things make sense to pray for. Does praying for something miraculous to happen in someone else's life so that they might believe lie outside of what God is willing to do? I don't know anymore.