Before Sunday evening prayer service, one our ministers allows people to share prayer needs with the congregation. We allow, even encourage, our children to speak their requests.

My 2 daughters always name the same things: my older daughter’s skin condition and my chronic headaches. I am told they also name these same requests every Wednesday night in their Kids’ Bible Night classes.

So recently my seven year old decided to save a little time. She raised her hand, waited to be called on, and then said, “Just the same old same old.”

There was a pause, and then the adults in the congregation laughed out loud. This was funny on several levels. First, the way she said it was funny. I didn’t even know she knew the phrase “same old same old.”

Mostly, though, it was funny because so many times in prayer we all feel like that. “Okay, God, not much has changed. You’re still awfully good to me. I’m still a sinner making mistakes and needing forgiveness every day. And I still need pretty much the same things.”

So what’s the point? The point is that we need to say it for our own sake. We need to be reminded of all of those things. We need to exercise our faith, continuing to trust Him for our needs. We need to include God into our lives.

We probably want to verbalize it a little differently, but “the same old same old” is not necessarily a bad thing.