February 2026
In February, we will focus on the Power of Prayer with Love at the Center. As we introduced our new theme for 2026 last month, we began the discussion about prayer that was both simple and yet deeply challenging—prayer is not a performance. It is not about saying the right words, sounding spiritual, or presenting a polished, perfected version of oneself to God. Prayer is a place of honesty.
Author and speaker Megan Fate Marshman aptly named this when we discussed how she challenged us to bring our whole selves before the Lord. Not the version of ourselves we think He wants, but the one we actually are. Prayer is where trust in the Lord grows, where we can learn to stop hiding, and where shame begins to loosen its grip. And when we start to trust more in the Lord, we begin to see even more how loving and graceful He is toward us.
This month, we focus on one of the most famous passages in the Bible: 1 Corinthians 13:1-8.
Many of us recognize it as “the Love passage.” It’s printed on wall art, read at weddings, and
frequently quoted. But behind our CEO’s desk, La Manda Cunningham has this passage on her
wall as a daily reminder of what living this love looks like. She carries this verse with a sense of
conviction and correction, just as the apostle Paul intended—not as sentimental, but as a
significant burden to bear as a gifted Body of Christ.
Paul addresses the church in Corinth, noting that they were very active, very gifted, and very
spiritual on the surface. Yet, something essential was missing at the core of who they were as
believers. Paul makes it very clear that spiritual gifts—including prayer—become empty when l
ove is not at the center. Sure, action without love might seem impressive, but it lacks strength and purpose. Without love, all that passion and service is just noise.
To paraphrase Paul, prayer is meaningless without love.
We can pray eloquently and fervently. We can pray Scripture-filled, awe-inspiring, faithful-sounding prayers, but if those prayers are not rooted in Christ’s love, they amount to nothing more than noise. That truth poses a question in our hearts this February, and it’s one that many of us do not like to sit with for very long.
How often do we pray lovingly and boldly for others, but avoid praying the same way for ourselves?
We are often quick to pray for TRM guests navigating trauma and grief, for families in crisis, our staff, our city, and the people we love, all in between. Yet, when it comes time to bring our own hearts before the Father, we hesitate. Why is that? Why do we think we need to tidy ourselves up? Our heart is precisely what the Lord wants. He desires our chaos, our doubts, and our stubbornness—all of it—to be transformed by Him.
We often find ourselves thinking, “I should be stronger by now,” or questioning if our problems are significant enough to bring to the Lord. We might also feel that God moves for others, but perhaps not for us. Marshman gave a voice to what many of us quietly believe when she said in a sermon, “God, it’s not that I don’t think You can… I just don’t think You will.”
This confession reveals the real issue underneath our hesitation. We do not lack faith in God’s power. Instead, we misunderstand God’s love. And this is where 1 Corinthians 13 speaks so clearly. This passage is not just a command we are supposed to live up to and strive to live out—it’s also a rhythm we are invited to live within. While love is something that God calls us to practice, it is something more than that. It is something that He reveals about Himself.
The apostle John writes in 1 John 4:8, “God is love,” which means love genuinely epitomizes the essence of God’s nature. For God, love is not merely an action or a feeling. It is part of His essence, most profoundly demonstrated in sending His Son, Jesus, to save the world. Therefore, since God is love, we can replace the word “love” in 1 Corinthians 13 with “God.”
God is patient.
God is kind.
God is not irritated.
God is not keeping score or holding a record of our
wrongdoings. He bears with us, believes for us,
hopes for us, and endures alongside us.
And His love for us?
It never ends.
This is crucial for how we pray.
Prayer must begin with receiving love, not with producing it. When we forget that we are loved, our prayer life can become uneven. We pray confidently and compassionately for others, yet we approach God for ourselves with caution and distance. We consider ourselves an exception to grace, as if the promises of love in 1 Corinthians 13 apply to everyone we serve, except us.
This month, we acknowledge the truth that some of our readers need to know—you are just as loved as those you pray for.
Praying for oneself is not selfish. It’s faithful, necessary, and essential for serving others with a healthy, God-centered heart. True service stems from love, not mere effort. Paul emphasizes this in 1 Corinthians, demonstrating that love and prayer are inseparable—without love, we are nothing, and prayer without love misses God’s heart.
That is why we are looking at February through this lens: to offer two meaningful yet straightforward invitations.
First, pray with love for others, not as a routine task, but with compassion and expectation that God will move, believing He is at work even unseen. Second, pray with love for oneself—acknowledge wounds, exhaustion, guilt, shame, and doubts honestly, since honest prayer requires love. Knowing we are loved transforms our prayers, replacing fear with boldness, resignation with hope, and doubt with expectation.
With love at the foundation of prayer, this is the heart of our theme, the Power of Prayer, for February. For our guests, our staff, and our readers, the invitation is simple and sacred. Pray because you are loved. Pray for others with compassion. Pray for yourself with honesty. And trust that His love never ends.
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