Hebrews 5:7 In the days of His flesh [speaking of Jesus], He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety.

Most Christians enjoy praying on a good day. We enjoy thanking God for blessings we see and glorifying Him for kindnesses obviously surrounding us. To the Christian, it is a real pleasure to say, “Thank you!” to God when life is wonderful and going our way.

However, praying to God on a bad day is an entirely different story. While the Christian is glad God is there to pray to on a bad day, it is much more difficult to see blessings on a bad day than on a good day. Yet, I suspect all of us have had bad days and prayed the following prayer in some form on those days.

“Lord, this is a horrible day. I am so shook up all I feel is anxiety! If something could go wrong, it has gone wrong. I feel awful! I am so discouraged and feel so blah! I feel like there is one knight fighting ten dragons, and I am that knight. My Christian armor may be protecting me, but it is getting uncomfortably hot in here.

“Most of the time my life flies by, but this bad day seems to be dragging on forever. I surely wish this bad day would come to a conclusion, and I could start fresh with a good day tomorrow—could you do that for me? God, I know You are there, but I surely have trouble seeing You. This bad day makes everything so dark I just do not see You at work as I did day before yesterday when everything was going great.

“Father, help me feel Your presence. Things are so bad I do not even know what to ask to make the day better. Just be close enough to me that I can sense Your presence, and—please—help this bad day come to an end.”

Everyone has bad days. Jesus had Gethsemane. Paul had the Damascus Road. Stephen was stoned to death. Out of Jesus’ “bad day,” God made a Savior. Out of Paul’s “bad day,” God made an apostle to the Gentiles. Out of Stephen’s “bad day,” God made a martyr whose faith encourages us 2000 years after his death.

Wonder what God will make out of your bad day? He is able to take your bad day and fashion it into something incredible and unbelievable—just like He made a Savior, an apostle, and an example from bad days. However, there is a price! The price is the faith of surrender. When we have the faith of surrender, God can fashion the incredible from our bad days.

Do not ask God to end your bad day. Ask God to use your bad day for His purposes. Then God can turn our bad days into salvation days.