Episode 9: Prayer
“What is prayer?” Prayer is basically the format by which we talk with God. The specific meaning of the word prayer is to beseech. In other words to earnestly ask, seek or request. Of course, all our prayers aren’t simply a request. Prayer is a way in which we can simply share our thoughts and heart with God. We can praise Him, we can repent. So it is certainly varied. But in terms of its definition, this is the most accurate.
There are lots of attributes of prayer that we can glean from scripture. Lets consider them:
Prayer is first and foremost private
Jesus in Matthew 6:6 tells us that when we pray, we are to go into our room, close the door and pray to our Father who is unseen. That doesn’t mean that prayer is always private of course. Because we see in Acts that the believers did pray together. But first and foremost, it is something that we do alone with God, just as Jesus often prayed by himself.
2. Prayer is a place where we share our needs
In Matthew 6:8, Jesus makes this interesting statement whilst contrasting the prayerful practices of the pagans. He says “for your father knows what you need before you ask Him.” Yes this statement is addressing the fact that we don’t need to babble and repeat ourselves over and over, thinking that this might influence Gods desire to grant our wish. But underlying this statement is the suggestion that God intends for us to pray for our needs. He expects that we would ask in prayer for our needs to be met. This can be seen in the Lord's prayer, where Jesus asks the Father to give us each day our daily bread. So whether physical, emotional or psychological needs, prayer is a place where we can request that He meet those needs.
3. Prayer is a continual and open conversation
In 1 Thessalonians 5:17 it says “Pray continually”. It’s as simple as that. Prayer doesn’t have to be something that finishes when we say Amen. It can be a continual open conversation with God. I am constantly praying in my head and talking to God. It’s a habit I began as a kid.
4. Prayer is powerful
This is probably the most common aspect of prayer that we hear about in Christian circles. James 5:16 says that the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. This is actually a fascinating and mysterious aspect of prayer. Prayer, which we generally consider to be a conversation between you and God...takes on this offensive weapon-like nature. Able to influence and impact. It would be unusual for us to think of human to human interactions and conversations this way. Especially conversations that are intended to produce intimacy. It is such a unique feature of prayer.
5. We can make all kinds of requests in prayer
Ephesians 6:18 tells us to pray all kinds of prayers and requests. There really aren't any limitations put on prayer in this way. We can do it at any time, all the time, and about anything.
6. We are to pray that we won’t fall into temptation
In John 17 Jesus actually prays for the disciples and he prays for all of us. One of the topics is protection from the enemy and sanctification. It is also a feature of the Lord's prayer, that we would not be led into temptation.
7. We are to pray for our enemies
Yep, this would be a hard one these days. We know that the world has shifted into this very intense period of labelling. Which I don’t really have an opinion of, except for the fact that I am worried about my capacity to keep up with it. But there is a lot more labelling like: victim-shaming, misogynists, patriarchy, colonialism, white privilege and many more...Now I’m not raising this to make some comment on the rightness or wrongness of this pattern, because as much as I hear Christians pointing the finger at this behaviour in criticism, we are just as guilty of the labelling
“oh they aren’t ‘spirit-filled’
“they are baptist”
“they are anglican”
“they are pentecostal”
“they are bapti-costal”
“they don’t believe in submission”
“they are a calvinist” “they are liberal”
“they are conservative”…
We have our own labels too that we’ve been using for a long long time. The point is, these labels can often produce this image of enemy lines. Or even just ‘us and them’. Maybe it’s not always that extreme. For instance, I don’t think the bapti-costals hate the pentecostals.
But the division makes us think that God is on our side only, when actually God is saying pray for your enemies. Pray for those you think are in opposition to you. I don’t think there are a lot of Christian feminists praying for people they would deem Christian misogynists...just saying. And I don’t think there are many white Christian men…that don’t believe women should preach that are praying specifically for women. Besides maybe their own wives or daughters. And whilst there may not be hate between them, I don’t think that many conservatives are praying for liberalists, except for asking God to change them.
If we really want to take Jesus' words seriously, we ought not to stand on the verses we claim and use when discussing our opinions...and fail to follow the directions of the verses that teach us how to live with those we disagree with.
8. There is a mysterious relationship between prayer, confession and healing
In James 5:16 again, it says:
“Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.”
This verse is saying that there is this relationship between prayer and confession, and healing. The author is saying that:
Confession + prayer for each other = healing
Now I can certainly see how this is true when it comes to emotional healing. I’ve seen it myself as a counsellor. And certainly when I have run some small groups, I have seen people break out of these old patterns and be healed because of vulnerability, friendship and prayer. So here is the other thing. This verse isn’t only talking about sins. Confession also means acknowledge. To acknowledge what is going on in your heart. To acknowledge our fears. So to do this with each other, and to pray for each other...provides a pretty good chance for God to heal us.
So why is this all so significant?
Why do we need to talk about prayer?
There are a few issues that we have with praying that might be prohibiting our experience of it.
We have sometimes turned prayer into a performance
I’ll be the first to say that it is really nice to listen to someone pray, who is great at articulation. And these people are often called “prayer warriors” and get asked to get up and pray at church or prayer meetings. And that’s all well and good. Except that it paints a picture that prayer is done a certain way, and needs to sound a certain way. I know so many people who are too shy to pray because they are concerned about the judgement that would get pronounced over their praying style.
If there is a possibility that my praying style is stopping other people from praying or causing them to feel self-conscious...I would shut my mouth. I would rather that everyone is praying, rather than one person because they sound good. Ok look, the significance of prayer is not in how it’s done, or how it sounds. Even if someone prays the same mundane prayer every day, it is no different in value to the powerful sound of a Bishop TD Jakes prayer. God listens still the same. He answers according to His will, not according to the sound of the prayer or the choice of words. In fact, if He was going to prefer any prayers, He probably prefer whichever prayer is the most sincere. Like the prayer of a child.
A sincere prayer has nothing to do with pitch, language, loudness or the number of words. A sincere prayer could be “Help me Lord”.
I mean consider Luke 18:10-14 where Jesus tells this story:
“Two men went to the Temple to pray. One was a Pharisee, and the other was a despised tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed this prayer: ‘I thank you, God, that I am not like other people—cheaters, sinners, adulterers. I’m certainly not like that tax collector! I fast twice a week, and I give you a tenth of my income.’
“But the tax collector stood at a distance and dared not even lift his eyes to heaven as he prayed. Instead, he beat his chest in sorrow, saying, ‘O God, be merciful to me, for I am a sinner.’ I tell you, this sinner, not the Pharisee, returned home justified before God.”
We have statements that conflict with our ability to keep our prayers sincere
When I was growing up as a young adult, I was very confused by this statement that I would hear: “Watch your confession”. So I believe it means, be careful what you say because words have creative power. So if you confess something negative you will create that negative thing. I have a pretty intense imagination, and I have to admit I would often imagine that some little demon would grab those words and go “yippee because she said it I can now go make it happen”...with a Gollum voice of course.
But why does it matter more what I say, than what I think? If I say I am successful but feel like an utter failure…How is that helpful? Are we seriously that afraid of the enemy and his minions, that we would knowingly create dissonance within us? This is a really confusing and conflicting concept. How can we be honest with God, and earnest in our prayers if we are more worried about what the enemy is doing? Especially when offering such earnest prayers to God is likely to heal us?
We have often decided that prayer is for certain people
Of course, intercessors feel a burden to pray. And I would go so far as to say that it is a part of their calling to the Body of Christ to pray. BUT, sometimes we can think that prayer is for the intercessors and not for the doers. There is nothing to suggest in scripture that prayer is NOT for every believer. It is not based on how busy you are, on your calling. We are all meant to pray. We are all meant to cultivate this kind of relationship with God. Paul was a busy man, but there is so much evidence that He was constantly praying. Jesus was a busy man, and yet he prayed at least 25 times in the gospels, that we are aware of. It was probably a lot more, especially when we read verses that say He would OFTEN slip away and pray (Luke 5:16). He once prayed all night. Jesus once prayed for so long that the disciples kept falling asleep while waiting for Him.
We are all meant to pray.
What you must know about prayer
We have this promise: When we pray, He listens. And not like most spouses from behind a phone, scrolling through Facebook or Instagram. God is attentive. He has heard even the things we haven’t said, that we don’t know how to articulate.
1 Peter 3:12 - For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are open to their prayer
Proverbs 15:29 - The Lord is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayer of the righteous.
Psalm 34:17 - When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles.
Isaiah 65:24 - Before they call I will answer; while they are yet speaking I will hear.
Psalm 18:6 - In my distress I called upon the Lord; to my God I cried for help. From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears.
Jeremiah 33:3 - Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known. I love this one! What a promise
Psalm 145:18 - The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.
It is one of the most valuable promises we have in God. Nothing we say is dead or forgotten. Every prayer is heard and tabled. Even the prayers we forget about...he does not forget. He hears us.
Just think about how crazy this is? And what a wonderful miracle! When I speak, my words arrive at the ears of the creator of this universe. I have an audience with the King of Kings, every time I open my mouth in prayer. Yeah even when I’m in the shower, or on the toilet. That’s actually absurd! But it is true.
And He has made sure that we are not confused on this matter, or that there would be no theological debate on the interpretation of it. This idea isn’t clouded by contextual issues or difficulties with application. Even if what you are saying is totally messed up, doctrinally questionable, or you’ve said it a thousand times. You don’t need to be a theologian to know this - GOD LISTENS TO YOU, EVERY WORD, EVERY TIME.
What are we missing?
In Matthew 21:13, Jesus has just walked into the temple courts and found people buying and selling products. He says:
“It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’
This is a reference to Isaiah 56:7 which is a prophetic declaration, that the temple would one day become a place for all nations. And boy is that significant, and boy is that exciting. BUT, that is not the only significant factor in this statement. He is saying that we, the collective of believers, that make up the temple of the Holy Spirit: would be a house of prayer. Prayer is supposed to be this defining hallmark of the church. In reality, there is not that much information about how a church is supposed to function. There is a lot about how we are supposed to treat each other, how we are supposed to love each other. But there’s not necessarily a great deal about what is supposed to happen in church. And yet there’s this! Prayer is one aspect that we can be confident is supposed to be a part of our DNA. Both as the church and as His people.
From my observations, it would not be accurate to say that the church is a house of prayer. There are plenty of people who pray, don’t get me wrong. And there are plenty of calls to prayer. But we would still be struggling to live up to this declaration that Jesus made. Most churches are quite similar when it comes to prayer. There is some type of corporate prayer meeting every 3 months. Prayer meetings before every service, and ministry time after the service. And maybe a midweek gathering for prayer.
The corporate prayer meetings might be ¼ of the church or a ⅓ if you are doing well. Prayer meetings before the service are usually all about the service. And might be between 5-20 minutes. Ministry time is obviously for the specific needs of individuals. And the midweek prayer gathering will usually only be the really serious pray-ers. Now I say all of this to make the point: we are a few rungs short of a “house of prayer”. It’s an area for great improvement.
Now I recognise that people pray at home, but I can’t imagine that the number of people praying would be grossly different to these proportions. Because you will make accommodations for that which you value. Now I don’t want to get legalistic about that. Like when people assume that people who don’t turn up to church, don’t love God…That would be a really basic mistake to make. What I am saying is that there probably isn’t any reason to think that people's approach to prayer would be diametrically different at home, then it is corporately. At least in principle.
OK, but what this all really tells me, is that we don’t really get prayer…We don’t really think it’s that powerful. We don’t think it’s more powerful than worship...we don’t think it is more powerful than the word being preached...And we definitely don’t think it’s more powerful than getting stuff done. We’ll talk about that a bit more in a moment.
Surely we are missing something about prayer if we think that it is secondary when Jesus said it was primary.
You know recently, I shared a post on Instagram that said “Revival Has Begun”. About 6 months ago, I had a dream in which I heard these words and I was announcing them to others. I truly believe that Revival has already begun. The Holy Spirit has been causing many to sift through their faith, to look deeper at what is the substance of their faith and be restored in a deeper relationship with Christ. Every Christian I speak to has been going through so much in the last 2 years, processing, piecing together, stripping away...It’s actually incredible and so coordinated by God. So here’s the thing. I have had these books on my shelf for ages that I bought all about revival. And I just happened to pick it up after sharing this post and began reading it. Imagine my shock when I realised that prayer is a really significant factor in pretty much ALL revivals. A significant number of revivals have started out of prayer meetings! So many have started from a small group of individuals, or even just 1 person getting down on their knees and praying! It hasn’t been because of the right combo of worship songs, or well-handled transitions. It hasn’t happened because a preacher had great sharable and memorable catchphrases. It hasn’t happened because the lighting was on point. None of these was a factor in a revival. No, when His people humble themselves and acknowledge their own inability to do what God can. When they pray with sincerity, that is a greater factor in the likelihood of revival happening than any well-run service. And it doesn’t even take a lot! Just a few people, just one person. That person could be me. That person could be you.
Now I don’t believe that revival is the goal of our faith experience. It is not necessarily what we are supposed to be aiming for. Our purpose is to make AND become disciples that run the race with increasing obedience and alignment with Jesus. But it is interesting to consider prayer from this angle, as an obviously defining factor, in the Holy Spirit moving in power. It gives life to 2 Chronicles 7:14:
“Then if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and restore their land.”
This is for us today. It is us that must be humble. We must pray and seek His face. We must repent for our faith and reliance on other means to bring a change to this world. Putting our faith in political giants, and church growth strategies, and leadership principles as though they ALONE can do what only God can. This verse reminds us that what we really need if we want to see His Spirit move upon the earth and transform it, is to be a people that get down on our knees and prays and acknowledges our mistakes. THEN will He respond and act.
Why isn’t prayer a higher priority?
It’s clear that prayer is so much more significant than we understand. We can see enough in scripture that suggests that prayer can change entire situations. So why isn’t it a higher priority? What is standing in our way?
We still think that the most significant thing we could do is ACT. Because when we do something, we feel like we are getting somewhere. We feel the momentum. And it convinces us that we can change the atmosphere.
This is counterintuitive to the mindset required to pray. Prayer says God will ACT, and that His actions...though I might not be able to hear or see it, is far more significant than anything I or any human can do.
See we don’t realise it, but as a society we really value ACTION. We like leaders that are the ‘take action’ kind of people. We are inspired by people who can get things done. We are excited when we see things happening. We look at high capacity people with sparkly eyes wishing we could achieve everything they are, and presume that this is the vision that God has for our lives. But as believers, it is not our capability that is the most significant factor in what is released and accomplished on this earth. It isn’t really what I am capable of that makes the difference in whether good things happen in and around me. Don’t get me wrong - there is a time for action. But there is always a time for prayer.
Lately, I have heard about a few situations that have stirred up that righteous anger in me. And whilst I have been praying, I have been crying out to God, “SEND ME!” Because I’m not really satisfied with just praying, I want to be a part of the solution. But no path has been opened up before me to do something. And that has been very frustrating. What it has done though, is cause me to ask this question
Why don’t I believe that my prayers, my most sincere and honest prayers, are equal in value to me doing something?
Why don’t I believe prayer is enough?
Why do I think it lacks something in comparison to getting my hands dirty?
Because the truth is that my prayers are probably of greater value than anything I could do.
When I act, to a degree I am mainly influencing the specific realm, time and place that I find myself in when I complete that action. For example, there are so many people who want to be preachers right. And I’m sure many of them have a legitimate calling to preach and that is fantastic. But there is a good chance that when I preach a sermon, I can only really impact a handful of people’s lives, the few people that are really paying attention. And that’s IF they decide that what I have said is a worthy message, IF it is applicable to their life and situation, IF it’s memorable enough, IF it is something they haven’t heard before, and IF it’s clear to them what they can do with that message. There is a lot of ‘ifs’ in this equation.
But when an earnest prayer is offered in faith, it can travel beyond times and generations, locations, and beyond the ordinary limitations that we accept as commonplace. Prayer gains access to spaces and places that nobody can. I will probably never meet the President of the United States or walk into the private spaces that He inhabits. But I don’t have to...because prayer gives me access. I can pray that God would speak to Him in the middle of the night, where no other audience has his attention. I can pray that God would show Him visions. I can pray that God would keep prompting Him in a way that He can’t rest until He acknowledges God's voice.
I can ask God to rally His angels to minister in places that I can’t and wouldn’t even see when I walk down the street. I can pray that God would eradicate every risk of domestic violence and sexual abuse in my suburb. Because there is no limitation on what I can pray, and what God can do with that prayer. I can be sitting on my little cheap green chair, with a broken cup of coffee, in my pyjamas, with not a single person in this world giving me a thought...with boring inarticulate words...praying for the salvation of an entire country, across the other side of the globe...and actually believe that it could happen!
Prayer is not a last resort friend. Prayer is the starting point of all. It’s not just a conversation, and praise God that we can talk to Him. But It is our continual invitation to Him to act. God loves to do, to act by creating and healing. And He will do it whether we ask for it or not. But relationally, it brings Him great joy when we keep inviting Him into our world and the world of others because we’ve trusted Him enough to ask.
It is also the most intimate place we can share with God. Is it really a surprise that one of the most powerful things in God's eyes, is the most relationally intimate and humble action we can take? Should it surprise us that He has created this innate potential at the heart of an activity that first and foremost is the birthplace of intimacy and connection? No, it should not at all surprise us that God's goodness is released across this earth every day, because of conversations with His children that are saturated in love and fellowship.
Prayer is powerful because God is powerful. We cannot separate our understanding of prayer from the one to whom we pray. When we do or don’t pray, it tells us so much about what we think of the one we pray to. When I don’t pray, I have a reduced comprehension of His capabilities. When I pray about everything, I lift the image of Him up to the place where God is God. Where He can create something out of nothing. I am declaring that His reign is of supreme importance to me. I am declaring that His will, shall be done, not mine. How we relate to Him in prayer says a lot about how we really view Him. Just like our other relationships. Who I decide to be vulnerable with says a lot about what I expect that person to do with my vulnerability. When I decide to hold myself back, it says a lot about what I expect to receive if I were honest. We can’t separate the nature of our communication from our perception of the hearer
One final thought, if there was anyone who could have afforded to NOT pray, it was Jesus. And yet He did. Regularly.
In John 17, we get to hear exactly what our saviour would consider worthy of praying for. And low and behold, He prays for you and me. He says:
I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
What an incredible prayer! Jesus’ greatest desire is that we would be one with Him. This is the ultimate level of intimacy. Perfectly united in love. We are still benefiting from this prayer thousands of years on. Every person who says yes to Him has the opportunity to grow in perfect unity with Him and receive every blessing that this kind of intimacy could bring.
So with all we now know and have considered about prayer, I ask you - what could happen on this earth if every believer really prayed? What could happen? What impossible barriers could be removed, what previously impenetrable strongholds could be broken? If we all just got down on our knees and prayed?