How many of you out there have this prayer thing nailed? And I mean no disrespect to God by asking that question. Pretty sure he knows that we, his people, struggle to know how best to communicate with him.
My favorite prayer times are when I just randomly talk to him. Let the Spirit guide my conversation with God. And I love prayer time when I’m mostly silent and just listen for his voice.
I’ve also tried to follow some general guidelines for how we can be sure we’ve “covered all the bases” when we pray.
Through the years, I’ve also used some prayer frameworks to keep me mostly on track, reminding us of some key elements to include in our prayers. Here are a couple of popular ones:
Praise
Repent
Ask
Yield
Adoration
Confession
Thanksgiving
Supplication
If using PRAY and ACTS helps guide your prayer life, I’m all for that. All of those prayer “parts” are important, if used with the right mindset.
“What might that be?” you ask. It’s praying from the heart rather than praying because you have an acrostic-type aid.
I’ve gone down all those roads in past years, but one consistent challenge for me might not appear as such on the surface.
My prayers are primarily interceding for others who have any kind of need – great or small. But don’t give me credit for being selfless. Here’s what drives that: I’ve said I would pray for them, or I feel the world needs prayer for something, or they are on my calendar that day or my prayer list. That’s a good thing, right?
Well, here’s the bottom line – I feel responsible to pray for them. Not because my prayers are the only way God will answer. Far from it. It’s because I have this over-inflated and misplaced sense of duty that compels me to pray for those who have asked, and many who have not!
Now, in and of itself, this isn’t a bad thing. I know prayer is powerful, effective and God-ordained. And intercessory prayer is a good thing.
Hold that thought.
Many studies on prayer take us, appropriately, to the Bible. What kinds of prayers do we see there? What model do we have for prayer?
When Jesus’ disciples asked him to teach them to pray, the result was The Lord’s Prayer. Most people in our Western culture are familiar with it, whether from reading the Bible, or reading a billboard. But I always felt like there was a missing piece because there wasn’t a clear place for the intercessory prayer. And yet I know that’s important because of Jesus’ prayer for his followers in John 17.
So a few days ago, when I decided to intentionally and slowly pray the Lord’s Prayer, God opened my eyes to a new interpretation of the well-known phrase, “Give us this day our daily bread.”
In the past, I’ve always understood this as asking God to give me what I needed that day, whether it be physical, emotional, relational or spiritual needs.
But this day, I had a new revelation. Whether this revelation matches all the tenses correctly from a theological view, I’m not sure, but the message hit home with me, nonetheless.
As I said the words, “Give US …”, I realized I wasn’t just praying that God would give ME what I needed. Yes, it is that, too, but it’s so much more. It became the phrase that asked God to give all those on my heart, and even those around the world that I would never meet, THEIR daily bread.
I started to see this as the intercessory prayer that I felt was missing from the Lord’s Prayer. Imagine that – me thinking that Jesus might have left something important out of his model prayer.
As I paused on that phrase, my mind scrolled through all those I specifically wanted to pray for, and any others that I wanted to pray over, even without knowing their “daily bread” needs.
At the risk of sounding flippant or disrespectful, it felt like a holy “catch-all,” reminding me that God does truly know what each of us needs daily.
So how does this change how I pray? Will I still pray for specific needs for my loved ones, and the world around us? Sure, I can’t see me abandoning that completely.
But when I want a biblical framework straight from the mouth of Jesus, I will delight in pausing over this powerful phrase as I let God bring to mind all those whose needs he wants me to pray over.
It’s just one more tool in the prayer toolbox, and I’m grateful God continues to be patient with me as he says, “Pray then like this…” (Matthew 6:9)
Rejoice in hope,
be patient in tribulation,
be constant in prayer.
Romans 12:12