How to Pray

Prayer Series Part 2: How to Pray

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In a previous article I talked about the five reasons why we need to pray. You can read that blog post Why We Need to Pray HERE.

To recap the five reasons we need to pray, and to do so every day are:

• prayer is how we communicate with God
• prayer helps us grow up as Christians
• prayer strengthens our inner man - our spirit
• it is through prayer that we exercise our faith in God
• prayer reinforces our love for God

So, we can clearly see why prayer is important and should be a priority in our lives.

But should we pray any old way? As believers is there a better way to pray to God our Father, with whom we have been given a personal relationship through our Lord Jesus Christ?

The simple answer to that is, yes, there is a better way to pray!

For our prayer to be effective and worthwhile we need to understand where we stand with God.  We also need to study what the scripture that applies to the body of Christ shows us about prayer, and then pray accordingly.

2 Timothy 2:15 - "15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth."

OK, so knowing this how do we pray?

Here are three steps:

1 - Start with the Right Heart:

When we pray we need to do so with the right heart.

What does this mean? It means that we understand where we are positioned with God, then we pray intelligently and scripturally with a believing heart.

When we are saved we become members of the body of Christ. That is our new position:

1 Corinthians 12:27 - "27 Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular."

Romans 12:4-5 - "4 For as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office: 5 So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another."

Ephesians 3:6 - "6 That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel:"

Having the right heart means that we have faith towards God and that we glorify God for who he is, what he says (his word) and what he has done for us (saved us and given us this awesome position!).

A believer with the right heart seeks to understand the gospel of grace and what grace has done for her. Grace is the foundation on which we rest in Christ and knowing this is where our spiritual understanding and growth need to start, otherwise things can go wrong and we can be at high risk of falling prey to false teachings.

When our heart is right we pray intelligently, scripturally and according to God's will for us. So we need to strive for this.

An important part of knowing God's will is knowing what promises God has made to us and  being really clear about what he has not promised us. It does not work for us to hijack promises that God has not given to us, the members of the body of Christ.

As members of the body of Christ we have not been given any promises concerning the earth or healing or physical things.

For example God has not promised us that he will heal us from sickness or ill health. If he did then every single person who prays to God for healing would be healed every single time.

Do we see this happening? No. Is God a liar? Absolutely not. That just doesn't happen to be something God has promised us.

That promise is for God's nation, Israel.

We, on the other hand, as the body of Christ, have been seated in heavenly places:

Ephesians 2:6 - "6 And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:"

and received all spiritual blessings already:  Ephesian 1:3 - "3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:"

To know this is part of coming unto the knowledge of the truth:

1 Timothy 2:3-4 - "3 For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour; 4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth."

Unfortunately many Christians have been falsely led to believe that if they believe according to the promises God gave to Israel hard enough and pray with enough faith that these prayers should be answered.

And if their prayer is not answered then it's their fault because they do not have enough faith.

This is serious stuff. It affects people's lives. It can lead to them falling out of faith with God.

Having been seated together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus puts an emphasis on spiritual things with regards to how we pray.

Regardless of what our circumstances happen to be in the flesh, God is always looking out for our highest spiritual good and in our growing our personal, relational and experiential knowledge of God.

Having the right heart also means that we understand that whatever we ask of or bring to God regarding our physical and material  circumstances, regardless of how important they might seem to be to us in the scheme of our lives in the flesh, answering that prayer may not actually be part of God's will for us.


2 - Pray the way Paul prayed:

Paul, who wrote thirteen Holy Spirit inspired epistles starting with Romans through to Philemon, prayed often in those letters, both for himself and for others.

I love the way Paul prayed in his epistles.

Paul is not only our pattern as members of the body of Christ, his prayers are also our pattern for prayer.

I find it beautiful the way Paul both prays for others and also requests that others pray for him.

We can deepen and strengthen our own prayer lives by praying through his Holy Spirit inspired prayers.

(On a personal note praying daily through Ephesians 1:15-23 and 3:14-21 has quite literally changed my life and my experience of understanding scripture.)

Here is where you will find a list of the scripture that contain the prayers that Paul prayed.

Paul's prayers dealt mostly with the spiritual but he also prayed for other things, including praying for healing for people and praying for kings and people in authority.

Some of his prayers were answered and others were not. That did not stop Paul from praying for these things, though.

Paul also prayed asking God to remove the thorn - the messenger of Satan to buffet him - in his flesh.

2 Corinthians 12:7-9 -

"7 And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure.
8 For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me.
9 And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."

God did not remove Paul's thorn, but instead, as Paul points out, God reminded him that his grace was "sufficient for thee".

All we who are saved have been given this incredible gift of grace, the greatest of all gifts that we could possible ever have today from God our Father in heaven.

Keeping this knowledge front and centre helps us to keep our prayer requests balanced and our prayer attitude in the right perspective. Especially when our prayers don't appear to be answered the way we may want them to be.

3 - Trust the Lord!

Just because you know that God may not answer all of your prayers does that mean that you should not ask him about certain things?

No it does not. When we pray with the right heart, know our blessings, walk in faith in those blessings, pray scripturally with a believing heart then we can simply trust the Lord, handing it all over to him knowing he will take it all from there.

We are in the best place we could ever be - in His hands!

Remember how Paul asked even when his prayers weren't answered? Follow his lead.

God loves you and he wants you to talk to him about the contents of your heart.

Therefore, do tell God your Father about your cares, worries, joys, and delights. But strive to keep a balanced perspective with regards to your prayers, understanding that there is much more to prayer than just asking God for things, but it is totally ok to ask!

Mull over things with God, share with him where you are feeling weak and where you want to be strengthened by his spirit and grow in wisdom and knowledge.

Talk to him about your concerns, challenges and worries.

Share your joys with God.

Thank him for what he has done for you and for his gift of grace.

Rejoice in him through your prayer daily.

Now I know that this may be a big shift in how you have both prayed and viewed prayer to this point in your Christian walk.

That is OK. Our God is a God of grace. He will have heard your prayers whether you prayed in the ways I have noted above or not. As a member of the body of his precious son and your savior, Lord Jesus Christ, God loves you and his grace abounds.

However, he does instruct in scripture that we grow up into mature Christians and that we come unto the knowledge of the truth.

Therefore we need to endeavor to grow in all areas of our Christian lives here on earth including how we pray. And we do this because we want to walk worthy of the gracious God who loves us and saved us.

God bless,

Clare

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