One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray.”

Luke 11:1

MY TWO SONS AND I…

Last Sunday, our church practiced social distancing while we walked around the church property praying for the needs of our community during the COVID19 crisis in our country. I had the privilege of walking with my two sons, and as we were looking at the prayer card, one of my boys asked me plainly, “Dad, how do you pray? I have a real hard time with it.”

This reminded me of the story of the disciples asking Jesus to teach them how to pray. And in the same way, I explained how the “Our Father” (Luke 11:2-4) is not given to us as a series of words to memorize and then chant back to God, but rather this prayer details the important subjects that God wants us to pray to him for:

(1) Our Father’s Name to be Exalted

(2) His Will to be Accomplished in Our Life as it is in Heaven

(3) Pray for Daily Needs

(4) Daily Forgiveness – Daily Forgive Others

(5) Led Out of Satan’s Snares

MY PERSONAL GUILT….

The Lord’s Prayer is meant to be easy. But why then does prayer seem so hard? And how do I go about talking about this without hypocrisy and false piety? How do I talk about this without unloading enormous guilt on the listener? I have decided to just be honest.

CONFESSION: This is the biggest struggle of my life because I have never lived up to my expectations in this area. The reasoning goes like this:

• If God is the greatest being and the most powerful being, then prayer is the greatest thing I could ever do.
• But if I were honest, which is tough to do, I don’t see him, I can’t touch him, I am not sure he really is answering, and I am not that stimulated when I pray.
• So, I often feel like I must do work that looks like I am working. Because hard work accomplishes tasks and praying is just sending words to the air. . .

OR IS IT? Both Jesus and Paul see prayer as a gift given to the child of God to meet with his Father. Over and over again in scripture, Jesus went to pray to get away from the crush of the crowd. Paul said that he devoted himself to prayer, and even wrestled in prayer for those he loved. So ask yourself honestly, how is your prayer life? 

Do you feel like you spend adequate time with God? 

Are you and God intimate? 

When a person is honest about this the overall feeling in their heart is failure. And failure causes you to want to run from God instead of running to him. So how do we change this, because prayer is intended to be our most powerful tool when life seems to be busting apart at the seams?

A CHANGE IN MINDSET

To destroy guilt and drive a proper motivation for meeting with God, I believe there are a couple of essential attitudes we must adopt as we approach the prayer closet:

(1) FREEDOM: We are not condemned because we fail to meet with God! Do you believe that?  

Romans 8:1 – Romans 8:34 – 1 John 1:7-9 – all confirm our freedom in Christ. Which verse speaks the most to you on the subject of freedom? 

(2) BLESSING: We actually can choose how much grace we want to receive. Do you want the blessing of God on your life? If yes – Pray. Do you want to know him more? If yes – Read his Word. Do you want to find a joy that is not contrived or dependent on circumstances? If yes – Fight for Intimacy with God!

Imagine if God said that there was a table loaded with the finest of food and drink in the other room. All you had to do was open the door. You don’t deserve the food, it is a gift from God to give you strength and joy. But to get to the food all you have to do is open the door. That is it. And that is prayer.

Sounds simple, doesn’t it? This is known as conditional grace. God has given his children loads and loads of tremendous promises, all we have to do is follow his instructions to get to the promises. This is the essence of faith: I believe that God rewards those who earnestly seek him. And prayer is the most direct and pure way to obtain his favor. It is not a burden, but rather it is a blessing. Do you believe this? 

HOW? HOW DO YOU APPROACH THESE HABITS?

“Relationship” is not a formula, it just is. Simply put, you must learn to nurture your delight in God in your own way. Sure there are helps and ideas and guidelines, but my walk with God is unique; because the walk with my brother Jesus and my Father God is unique. Look to your own family, does everyone relate the same with your dad? Do you talk the same way to your brother as your sister talks to him? No, that is because everyone’s relationship is different. So it is with the person of God. Because God is a person.

Both my sons and the disciples were honest enough to admit to the truth – that talking with the invisible God is not as easy as it sounds. But if we trust Jesus, and pour our heart out to the Father, he will meet our needs in ways we can never imagine. It may not be immediate, but it will be suprising.

So even if it is raining, and you are not able to drive to work, you can go to God and ask him to work for you. God is always working (John 5:17). Do you realize, he has been waiting years for this…

For you, his child, to simply trust him. That is all prayer is.