Prayer is Love

I was talking with a lady yesterday about My Favorite Scriptures and I quoted, “It is by the prayers of the righteous ye are spared.” (Alma 10:23)

“Does that mean that we are wicked?”  She asked.

I was stunned. “I never thought of it that way,” I finally answered and I hadn’t. It is true that Nephi is talking fire and brimstones in that passage but, I find great comfort in that scripture. Prayers are love. When someone prays for you it is because they love you. That is what that scripture means to me. Where would I be now if I hadn’t had the prayers of my Grandmother, and others?

Are we wicked? Well yes I guess we all are, but it’s more a matter of degrees I think. Anything that takes me away from the Holy Spirit is cause for prayers, and that happens every day. I need to pray and I need the prayers of others. I need your love, I need your caring and I need to pray for you because you also need love and caring. I can feel the effect of having someone pray for me. It feels like love and hope and you need that as much as I do.

Was it because the scripture says the “prayers of the righteous” that she felt that way? It does sound like Nephi’s making a division there, but again I suppose it is a matter of degree. While my grandmother was certainly a righteous woman and did many charitable things she was not perfect and neither am I. We have to be righteous to some degree or we cannot pray for others because I don’t think God is going to heed a prayer that says, “Cause misfortune and shame to come upon my neighbor.”  

Who are the righteous anyway?  That too is all of us who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and call upon his name.