Do you remember where you were when you first learned to pray?
Maybe it was kneeling beside your bed as a child, small hands folded while a parent listened. Maybe it was sitting in a pew, watching sunlight filter through stained glass. Maybe it was walking in the woods, or driving alone on a highway, or standing in a hospital corridor at two in the morning.
Location matters more than we think.
Mountains and Rooftops
Elijah climbed to the top of Mount Carmel to pray for rain. He needed the high place—the wide view, the thin air, the sense of being closer to heaven. When you're asking God to end a three-year drought, you want to be as far from the parched earth as possible.
But this week, as I've watched coverage of the flooding in Texas, I keep seeing a different geography of prayer. People praying from rooftops, waiting for rescue. Families praying in evacuation centers, having lost everything. Emergency workers praying as they wade through rising waters.
These prayers aren't coming from mountaintops. They're coming from the lowest places—from the valleys where water collects, from the spaces where we're most vulnerable.
Praying in the Capital City
There's something unique about praying in a city built for governing. In Washington, the high places aren't just geographical—they're institutional. The Capitol dome, the Supreme Court, the endless office buildings where briefings happen and strategies form. Most of us work in the ecosystem around these places—advocacy groups, legal practices, research organizations. We're close enough to see how decisions get made, far enough away to feel helpless sometimes. So we pray—for wisdom in our work, for patience with the process, for hope that change is still possible—as we do our part to nudge the world toward compassion and justice from whatever corner we occupy.
But we also know the low places—the moments when we're scrolling through news that breaks our hearts, conversations with friends who've lost hope in institutions we're trying to serve, the honest question that surfaces in quiet moments: "Does any of this matter?"
And here's what strikes me: both kinds of prayer get heard.
Every Elevation
The God who met Elijah on the mountain is the same God who hears our rooftop prayers—when the floodwaters of national turmoil or personal crisis rise higher than we can handle. Whether we're praying from positions of influence or from places where we feel completely powerless, God's presence reaches every elevation of human need.
But it does shape how we pray. From the high places, we pray for systems and solutions. From the low places, we pray for strength to get through today.
Maybe that's why we need both kinds of prayer in our lives. The high places teach us to trust God's bigger purposes. The low places teach us to trust God's immediate presence.
I don't know where you are today—mountaintop or rooftop, high place or low place. But I know this: God hears prayers from every elevation.
Wherever you are, God is there too.
Peace,
