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What is Prayer?
- Dependency upon God
- Prayer is simple. It is nothing more than talking and listening to God. It is two-way communication.
Why Are We Not Satisfied with Our Prayer Life?
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Unsatisfied
prayer
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Satisfied prayer
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Panic-based,
carnal, soulish
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Spirit-filled, Spirit-led and faith-based
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Praying
for outer life
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Praying
for inner life
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Rigid,
duty-oriented, time-bound, obligation prayer
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Communicating
with God throughout the day, complete dependency
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Irregular
prayer
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Regular
disciplined without being a legalist
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Fear,
doubt
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Boldness,
privilege of sonship, expectation
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Now let us read Lk 11.1-8
Why Should We Pray, “Lord, Teach Me to Pray” as the Disciples Did in Luke 11:1?
If you are frustrated in your prayer life, you need to pray, “Lord, teach me to pray.”
We know we should pray. We know many ideas about prayer. Sometimes we try to imitate others but fail to continue it.Personalized communication and relationship:
Everyone has to keep certain principles in prayer. However, prayer should be personalized in an individual’s life in a unique way. That’s why we need to pray, “Lord, teach me to pray,” as the disciples asked Jesus. It is a personalized plan for one’s life in which they communicate with God intimately and personally from heart to heart.God has a unique plan and way for every one of us to relate with Him. Everything in our spiritual life depends on our personal faith in God and our personal relationship with Him. We have free access to God at any time through prayer (Eph. 3:12).
Embrace our uniqueness:
We are all different. Jesus delights in our distinctiveness. He also helps us in our distinctiveness to pray and maximizes our personal relationship with God. Psalm 33:15 says, “He who fashions the hearts of them all and observes all their deeds.” Because God has fashioned our hearts individually, our prayers need to flow naturally out of our hearts and be consistent with the way He has designed us.God likes to relate with us in our original being. One of the greatest discomforts in prayer is trying to follow others and their methods instead of following our unique style. We are not called to do what someone else is doing or to follow man-made rules.
Key to Prayer: Friendship with God
John 15:13-17:
Jesus calls us His friends. We need to approach Him as a friend in our prayer. A natural friendship involves loving and being loved. You can be as close to God as you want to be; it all depends on the time you are willing to invest in the relationship. See the following differences in different approach
to God:
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As
a friend
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Not
As friend
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Love, boldness, freedom
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Duty, fear, bounded
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Free communication from a open heart
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Legalistic, maintain secrecy
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Continuous communication
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Infrequent
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Growing intimacy, maturity, deep
bonding, knowing each other
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Ups and down in intimacy or complete
lacking of intimacy, not knowing heart to heart
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Example 1: Abraham the friend of God
Isa 41.8; Jas 2.23 and 2Chr 20.7 God calls
Abraham “My Friend.” Gen 18 is the best example of Abraham’s friendship with
God. From Gen 18, the following principles can be derived:
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Friend-friend
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Master-slave
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Look
who he is
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Always look to hands (materialism) or
what he can
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Obedient
in love: obedience to God is key to deepen your relationship with God
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Obedient not in love but in fear
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Sharing
each other’s heart and plans: God shares things with us- His heart, His
desires, His purposes and intentions
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Not much sharing. Spirit of slavery and
orphan spirit
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Talks
like friends: prayer is a two-way communication
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Authoritative or partial, no freedom to
express
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Relate
each other not master-slave but as intimate friends
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Example 2: Friend at Midnight (Luke 11:5-8)
Friendship breeds boldness:
God wants to hear bold, confident, faith-filled prayers prayed by truly just and righteous people who are secure in their friendship with Him. A friend in need approached his friend, busy at midnight.Hebrews 4:16 says, “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
Persistence:
The friend in need continuously asked, even though he was initially reluctant. Shameless persistence will definitely bring answers from God. The issue is giving up.Our friendship with God will bring benefits to others:
Through Abraham, Lot was blessed. And the friend at midnight was blessed.
*Taken from Joyce Mayer's book Simple Prayer