Prayer

When people are faced with an important decision or are facing a difficult challenge, they often think they need a power beyond themselves.  For example, famous tennis pro, Serena Williams, is known to wear the same unwashed socks when she's on a winning streak and to bounce her tennis ball exactly five times before her first serve.  I am sure these desperate attempts to harness an “outside power” work wonderfully for her.  Some people carry a rabbit’s foot or place a plastic Jesus on the dashboard of their car for protection.  I know a person who wears a special shirt when watching his team play so as to empower the team to win.  A rational person certainly wonders about the relationship between these superstitious acts and the desired outcome. 

However, it is an amazing thing that we mere humans can present our requests to a real outside, infinite power, the Creator of the Universe.  There is nothing more powerful in our lives than to be linked with the infinite God  We can speak words that reach the throne room of the universe.  How much more valuable is this than superstition.  What a privilege we have as believers! 

Prayer is not a ritual that has to be performed in a precise way.  We can pray while kneeling, walking, driving, or working.  We can pray out loud or silently in our thoughts.  It is not a superstitious method to get God to hear us.  It is a real access to power from a God who is more anxious to bless us than we are to ask.  Have you ever heard the saying, “Prayer is the opening of the heart to God as to a friend”?  Of course you have; it is from Steps to Christ page 93.  You can approach God as easily as you converse with a friend. 

Yet, there is a science of prayer.  Whole books have been written on the subject, so I won’t attempt to explain the science; I am a weakling, myself, in this science.  Yet, there are some important conditions to answered prayer that we can examine. 

• We must feel our need of help from Him.  He has promised, “I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground” (Isaiah 44:3). Those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, who long after God, may be sure that they will be filled. 

• We must believe that God loves us and wants to bless us.  “Anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek him” (Hebrews 11:6).   

• We must have faith that our prayer will be answered, although it may be in a way consistent with His will, not ours.  We should not presume to know what is best for us, but allow God to answer in a way that is immensely greater than we think to ask.  “What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them” (Mark 11:24).  “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened” (Matthew 7:7, 8). 

• We must not let prayer take the place of obedience.  “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you” (John 15:7). 

• We must pray in Jesus’ name.  “Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son” (John 14:13).  To pray in Christ's name means that we are to accept His character, manifest His spirit, and work His works. 

Just as healthful food is essential to physical life, prayer is essential to spiritual life.  Yet, many Christians have a nonexistent or feeble prayer life.  A vibrant prayer life is something that requires effort to establish and improve.  When Christians do not consciously practice and strengthen the prayer life, they can become playthings of Satan.  I understand this in my own prayer life.  I seem so weak at it; my mind wanders; my prayers seem so repetitious, but improving prayer is worth focusing on the issue.  Seek it and you will find it.  Please join me in this endeavor.