Expectant Prayer

“O Lord, hear me as I pray; pay attention to my groaning. Listen to my cry for help, my King and my God, for I pray to no one but You. Listen to my voice in the morning, Lord. Each morning I bring my requests to You and wait expectantly.” Psalms‬ ‭5:1-3‬ ‭NLT‬‬

I love Psalm 5. There is something about the words and content that resonates with the way I think, the way I feel. David, the Psalmist, is very open with God, and he expresses his thoughts in a way that helps all those in a similar place and with similar feelings, emboldening faith in, and communication with, God Himself.
But what were his early morning groans all about? Were they related to the dawning realisation that the problems taken to his pillow the night before were still there when he awoke? Or was he in some sort of pain, perhaps from an injury or wound? One thing for sure though, and that was his expression of absolute dependency on his God, who was the focus of his prayers, expressed first thing in the morning. His prayerful cries for help were the first thing on his mind as the new day dawned, but his petitions were not just launched into a void, lost and forgotten. David waited for an answer. We would do well to do the same. Too often I pray without any real expectation that an answer was on its way. Too often my morning prayers lack any real sense of a need for God’s help. Too often I take things for granted, not even bothering to thank the Lord who made all things possible. My bed of comfort replaces David’s bed of groans. Please help me, Lord, to enter David’s zone of expectant and powerful prayers.