Welcome to today's encouragement from Our Daily Bread.

The reading for today titled Treasured Prayer was written by James Banks.

The Clark's Nutcracker is an amazing bird.

Every year it prepares for winter by hiding tiny caches of four or five white bark pine seeds,

as many as 500 seeds per hour.

Then, months later, it returns to uncover the seeds even under heavy snow.

A Clark's Nutcracker may remember as many as 10,000 locations where it has hidden seeds,

an astounding feat, especially when you consider the difficulty we humans can have

remembering the location of our car keys or glasses.

But even this incredible act of memory pales in comparison with God's ability to remember our prayers.

He's able to keep track of every sincere prayer and remember and respond to them even years later.

In the book of Revelation, the Apostle John describes four living creatures and 24 elders

worshiping the Lord in heaven.

Each one was holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of God's people.

Just as incense was precious in the ancient world, our prayers are so precious to God

that he keeps them before him continually,

treasured in golden bowls. Our prayers matter to God because we matter to him. And through his

undeserved kindness to us in Jesus, he offers us uninhibited access. So pray boldly,

and know that not a word will be forgotten or misplaced because of the amazing love of God. Today's Our Daily Bread devotional

scripture reading is from Revelation chapter 5, verses 6 through 10.

Then I saw a lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing at the center of the throne,

encircled by the four living creatures and the elders. The lamb had seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven

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