__Hello, I am delighted to have this opportunity to share with you some thoughts on prayer, specifically women praying scripture and principles from scripture. This will be the first in what I trust will be a series that honors God and encourages us in the direction of more effective praying.

__So I invite you to come along with me as we travel this road of learning more about praying God’s words and principles back to Him. We will begin our journey by recognizing who we are according to Psalm 103:14.

__ I remember to this day the excitement of discovering what this meant to me as a child of God seeking to speak to and hear from my Father. I was praying for a very heart-rending personal need (one I had been praying about for a long time). I was acknowledging the poverty of my ability to solve or even emotionally deal with this particular problem when God spoke to my heart from Psalm 103:14. In this verse David says, "For He Himself knows our frame He is mindful that we are but dust."

__I was stunned as my mind began to grasp the meaning of this word picture. Ladies, think of what it means to be a "Dust Woman." We all know what dust looks like, of course some us have a better understanding of this than others depending on our housekeeping skills, nevertheless we all are well acquainted with dust. A dust person is very fragile, very frail and very weak; she is unable to stand up under or withstand anything.

__Think of yourself in your mind's eye as a "Dust Woman" and along comes a wind of adversity or a breeze of prosperity, what happens to you? You would be "Blown away," scattered every which way. Think about it as you picture this in your mind. We could not stay together if even the lightest breeze were to blow over us.

__ Furthermore, my precious Dust Sister, it is sometimes those Breezes of Prosperity that present the most danger as Proverbs 30:8-9 says, "Give me neither poverty nor riches; Feed me with the food that is my portion. Lest I be full and deny Thee and say, ‘Who is the Lord’ Or lest I be in want and steal, And profane the name of my God."

__ The conclusion we must come to, either way, the Winds of Adversity or the Breezes of Prosperity are too much for Dust Women.

__ Furthermore, think carefully of this wonderful word picture God is giving to us. A Dust Woman such as you and I cannot stand up under burdens or weights of any kind. Picture yourself as God’s Dust Woman and you are standing and someone comes along and places a burden or a weight on your shoulders. What would happen to you? You are unable to bear up under the pressure; you would dissolve in a gray, powdery heap on the ground.

__This is the bad news; but there is good news, really good news. Look again at Psalm 103. We learn from verse 13 that "Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him." From where does this compassion come? It comes from this knowledge He has of us, you and me, the knowledge that we ARE "Dust Women." And His is full and truthful knowledge, He knows our temperament, our besetting temptations and weaknesses, why we react the way we do in certain situations, the manner in which we arrive at our opinions, our hurts, our dreams, expectations and desires that may as yet, be unfulfilled. He knows all of this and more.

__It is this intimate knowledge that moves Him to compassion; compassion compared to that of a really good father who adores his child and desires the best for that loved child.

__ The word used for compassion is in the present tense. In other words we are being told that God is "compassionating us." He has compassion on us in the future and He has compassion on us right now in our present situation. He is feeling right now with you, Dust Sister, and me, all of our hurts and sorrows and confusions.

__That being established as a starting point for our journey we will look in the following months at how we, as "Dust Women," can pray scripture words and principles and be DUST WOMEN WHO ARE UNLEASHERS OF OMNIPOTENCE upon our world.

__Good-bye for now sister DUST WOMEN, may our faithful God take what you have read and put it through the grid of His omniscience and teach you how to apply it to your life and relationship with Him.