Several years ago at our Bible study, the leader gave each of us a jar with unshelled walnuts, and rice filled in around them. They were a gift meant to remind us how to do it—how to fit prayer into our overfull days—which she then demonstrated.

Into her own empty jar, the leader poured rice, and then tried to insert all of her own walnuts.

They didn’t fit, that way.

Emptying the jar again, this time she put the walnuts in first, then poured in the rice, and everything fit—each walnut and every grain of rice.