How’s Your Prayer Life?
Have you ever watched the movie, War Room? One of my favorite scenes (not just because it involves coffee) is when Miss Clara asked Elizabeth how hot her prayer life was. Miss Clara goes on to hand her a warm cup coffee because Elizabeth said her prayer life wasn’t hot or cold, it was somewhere in the middle. Miss Clara knew how important prayer was so she wasn’t afraid to ask challenging questions to Elizabeth. Friends, if you were to receive a cup coffee right now based on your prayer life would it be hot, cold or barely warm? how to pray
The Importance of Prayer
Prayer is a gift that God has given his children. Really pause for a moment and think about that. Through Jesus, we are able to talk with the creator of the world and be heard. We can go to him and simply say thank you or bring him our emotions, problems, joys, etc. He delights in hearing from each one of us. Staying in continuous communication with God builds our relationship with him, it’s also the main way we fight our battles caused by the brokenness of this world.
Prayer is our weapon
We know this world is not our permanent home and we hold onto the hope that eventually, we will return to our true home with Christ. Until that happens, God placed each one of us here for a specific purpose (you can read more on finding your purpose HERE). We have many hardships that come our way, due to free will and the choices we, and others make. It’s not a secret that the enemy is after our souls and if he can get into our minds to keep us confused, he will. One of the best things we can do is go directly to our heavenly father in prayer.
In Ephesians, Paul concludes his letter writing on the armor of God.
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.
In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
And PRAY in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people…”
Ephesians 6:10-18
Paul puts an emphasis on the importance of prayer. Not just doing it once or one specific kind of prayer, but all kinds and requests. Before that, he’s explaining the spiritual battle going on that we cannot physically see. Our way into that is prayer.
The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”
James 5:16
Prayer changes things
I love that verse from James (5:16), it let’s us know how effective the prayer of righteous man is. Being deemed righteous isn’t by being the perfect Christian, it’s about your faith. Remember in Genesis, when God deemed Abraham righteous?
“Abraham believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness.”
Genesis 15:6
SO- in other words, the prayer of a man who has faith is powerful and effective! That of course, doesn’t mean all of our prayers are answered in the exact way we want them to be, but we can trust that God hears us and is working on them (even if it doesn’t turn out the way we planned).
Have you ever woken up from a deep sleep with someone on your mind? Whenever this happens I feel nudged to pray for that person and I’ll be honest, I don’t always see what that prayer does for someone, but I know who I am praying to (which is all the security I need with those prayers).
The Exchange
We’ve talked about the devil attacking our minds and even the one’s we care about. We can’t always change our external circumstances, but we can boldly pray for an internal shift. Imagine the change in our world, if we all used prayer as our first line of defense when things go wrong. When someone looses their temper on us, instead of delivering the same temperament, we could pray that the Lord would give us his perspective, helping us gain compassion for the person and prevent our tongue from speaking death. Or when someone is driving a little too slow in the left lane (don’t worry, I know how you feel 😅), we can ask the Lord to fill us with his patience.
Maybe you’re in a situation that is full of uncertainty and you don’t know what to do. We could pray that the Lord would help us wait on him, placing our trust in him- to replace our anxiety with his peace. Friends, whatever the prayer is, God longs to hear from us and he hears us.
The Lord is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayer of the righteous.”
Proverbs 15:29
How to pray
We constantly read about Jesus going away to spend time praying on his own with God. He modeled the importance of it to his disciples. His disciples noticed this practice of his and wanted to be taught,
“One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.”
He said to them, “When you pray, say:
Luke 11:1-2
Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.”
MAtthew 6:9-13
It’s not a perfected speech
Jesus gave us an outline of how to pray, but we don’t have to have a perfect-formal speech when coming to him. There are times I use that prayer, have a short prayer, or vent to him like a friend. I keep saying this, but he really does delight in hearing from us and we also have the Holy Spirit to speak on our behalf. Sometimes things are heavy and we just need to silently sit in his presence.
Encouragement + Challenge
Friends, if your prayer life isn’t where you’d like it to be, ask yourself why. What prevents you from speaking to your heavenly Dad? Do you feel like he doesn’t care, are you angry, or struggle with what to say? If so, bring that to him, I had a pastor tell me God can handle our anger, just be honest with him and let him in- let him work in your heart.
How would you talk about your day to a parent, friend, or loved one? Because the Lord can be that for you too. Would you join me in a challenge over the next three days? Start the day with thanking God for one thing every morning and in the evening tell him one good thing and bad thing that has happened. Take three days to get in the habit of speaking to him.
With love, Em
