How Do You Pray? (Part 3)

In our preparation to explore again the model prayer that Jesus taught His disciples, we must be reminded that prayer is not twisting God’s arm—talking Him into something that He might not otherwise have considered. Also, prayer is not an attempt to change His mind. Neither must we think that in order to get a hearing we must be “good” by trying to clean up and get “worthy.” We must be holy, but that is God’s work, not ours.

Others seek to secure the aid of those thought to be spiritually more acceptable to God, particularly “saints” who have passed and have immediate access to God, to put a good word in for them. Sadly, these concepts of prayer are unbiblical and pagan.

The Bible teaches that prayer is communicating with God. Some do not pray because they are self-sufficient and see no reason to communicate with Him. However, we are not sufficient of ourselves; thus, we are completely at His mercy. We need Him. As Paul said, “God, who made the world and everything in it [needs nothing, but] gives to all life, breath, and all things . . . So [all] should seek the Lord . . . and find Him . . . for in Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:24-28). Prayer is feeling after God by one who knows he is a beggar and prays as an expression of that dependency. John the Baptist reminds us, “A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven” (John 3:27).

Biblical praying is childlike reverence and trust in God as a Father. The Lord is loving, accepting, providing wise attendance over His children as a wise parent thoughtfully regards the needs and wants of His children.

Since Jesus made it clear that “your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8), why, then, should we pray? It is because God commands us to do so. “In this manner, therefore, pray [an imperative]” (Matthew 6:9). “Pray [an imperative] without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Jesus is our great example. “[He, the God-man] often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed” (Luke 5:16).

Finally, we need to be reminded also of the value of our prayers, particularly as we approach the end of the age. Upon the revealing of the worthiness of the Lamb to open the seven-sealed scroll, Revelation 5 records the worship of the throne attendants: these “fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints” (v. 8). Our prayers are a great part of the worship of Heaven.

Again, the opening of the seventh seal reveals that the prayers of the saints will be involved in the judgment to fall on the world of the ungodly as Jesus subjects His enemies to the footstool of His feet (Revelation 8:1–5).