10/03/2023
“How is my prayer life?” This is something that each one of us should ask ourselves from time to time, and it should cause us to adjust our prayer regime according to God’s response. Searching for the answer to this question should be more than personal introspection. When we pose this question we should be asking that God also speak to us regarding the health of our prayer life because it is He with whom we are speaking.
“And when he had entered the house, his disciples asked him privately, "Why could we not cast it out?" And he said to them, "This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer."”
Mark 9:28-29 ESV
When Jesus had cast an unclean spirit out of the boy, the disciples wanted to understand how He was able to do this when they were not. The answer to that question should have convicted them like no other. “This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer." Is our prayer life as strong as it is meant to be, or is it lacking in some way like those of the disciples?
Are there things in our lives that we pray over, but we don’t seem to receive an answer for? Do we kneel repeatedly before God asking for His help and hear only silence in return? If so let’s ask ourselves if we are truly listening for our Father’s voice, and then let’s ask the Holy Spirit “am I really praying, or simply talking at God?”
“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.”
Romans 8:26 ESV
Every morning I rise before dawn to read scripture, pray, write, and sometimes I might even write before I pray. There is a purpose in the order I have selected for my morning routine, but it hasn’t always been so. I used to rise in the morning and immediately begin to pray. I had items that I needed God to address and I ran through them as if by their sheer emphasis, and repetition, He might be worn down and eventually respond to them.
What I was doing wasn’t terrible, but it didn’t allow for my spiritual preparation to enter into my time of prayer, and it didn’t encourage the relationship and conversation I was seeking. No, I was simply chanting, or reciting my desires. I had needs, other people had needs, and I was asking God to answer me as I asked Him for them. My wants were so important to me that I felt like I needed to put them before all else... even before my own relationship with the Lord. Seeking His love, and preparing ourselves to do His will are all important, and we need for them to precede everything else. They should have been paramount to me, and the emotion of the moment should have been welling up within me… yet this was often missing.
I am a morning person. I wake up ready to begin my day, but by evening I am longing to retire... I am exhausted. On the other hand, my wife is a night person. She rises later in the morning, and if I speak to her before she has had time to consume a couple of cups of coffee I have set myself up for her chiding correction. I go by the old adage “early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy wealthy, and wise!” She, on the other hand, will readily tell you that this is not true of everyone, and that many people don’t hit their stride until later in the day... and she is right.
I can’t tell you how often I have risen in the morning to find our house has mysteriously been rearranged during the night. The kitchen is clean, my coffee cup sitting in front of the coffee maker, and any number of other amazing things have occurred. It is as if I were Ebenezer Scrooge in “A Christmas Carol” and in sheer joy I say “I haven’t missed it. The spirits have done it all in one night.” On the flip side, my wife finds this to be true as well, but it is what I have done in the wee hours of the morning while she is asleep. The point of this story is that we all have times when we are most productive, and that is true of our ability to pray as well.
“In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God.”
Luke 6:12 ESV
“My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up.”
Psalm 5:3 KJV
So some of us are morning people while others are night people, but on occasion we break our routines… I often wake up sometime after midnight and feel the overwhelming need to pray. What happens next depends on the urgency that the Holy Spirit has placed upon me, and the nature of that calling. It is the difference between a child crying “HELP!”, or someone waving to us as they say, “can you help me please?” In fact, it boils down to whether the Spirit has called me fretfully from my slumber, or if something is mildly bothering me and I just need to pray. Either way, if the Holy Spirit is waking me, I dare not ignore His voice, and I need to pray. Most of the time I will have been prepared to pray before the Spirit shakes me from my slumber, but sometimes I find that I need to prepare my spirit for the coming conversation. We know which it is because we feel it. If we are covered in sweat and there is an urgent need to come before the Lord then we are ready, but is we simply wake up from a dream that bothers us, then we need to prepare ourselves.
“and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.””
Luke 22:46 ESV
Being still, Reading, and sometimes writing, before we pray allows us to prepare ourselves for a prayerful conversation with God. Having such a conversation with Him is similar to having a conversation with anyone else in that we must first seek them out. Then, once we have found them, we need to be in the right frame of mind to have the conversation. Prayer is an intimate discussion with our Heavenly Father, and it is also our time of petition before the Creator of the Universe. We come to our Father with a warm embrace and tender love, and we come to the throne of the Creator overwhelmed with awe, and supplication... each of these requires us to still ourselves and prepare our mental and spiritual state for the interaction.
So, how is our prayer life? Are we treating every conversation as if it were a decree, or a time to read off a list of demands? Have we even found God’s presence before we begin to speak? Is our spirit and mind in the right place for the conversation that we wish to have, or are we just going through the motions? Do we find ourselves to be like a night person who is attempting to pray in the morning when we are not all there, or perhaps a morning person praying in the evening when we are already physically and mentally spent?
Our prayer life might be great and satisfying, and we might have found just the right times for our most meaningful interactions with the almighty, but is there some habit of ours that might be irritating to God, or vice versa, that if we were able to address it could make our time together even more rewarding and intimate? We have times of honesty with our spouses, and those around us... why not God? Revealing our deep needs, or hearing His corrections, can be difficult, but once they have been brought into the open, and addressed, then our relationship reaches a new level of comfort and the road to one another’s hearts is smoother, straighter, and without distraction. Telling Jesus, or Abba our Father, what is bothering us is only part of this kind of conversation... listening as we receive their correction is the other part. How complete is your payer life?
Prayer:
Father, I thank you for the absolute honesty we can have with one another. I thank you for the many corrections I receive from you and how they bring us closer together. Holy Father, help me to prepare myself before our times of prayer. Lead me to that state of mind in which I can come before you with my heart circumcised and prepared to experience you in supplication and awe. Be patient with me Father as I concentrate on my love for you and prepare myself for the embrace I have for you. When I pray my needs, and the needs of others, let me do so out of love, sincerity, and from my heart; never let me read a list to you Father, because when doing that I have no heart, no true concern, in my requests. Let my heart and spirit open themselves to you, and let my ears hear your voice as you speak back to me in the quiet of my closet. Give me the humility I need to hear your voice and do your will. Let our time of prayer together reflect my desire for you and not just my own earthly desires. Jesus teach me to pray, and correct those things that keep me from praying effectively. Teach me to open my heart before entering my prayer closet. Teach me to hear the will of God, and teach me to obey. Show me the awe, the wonder, the majesty, the glory, and the grace of my God as I bow before Him... never let my prayers treat Him with disrespect, but honor Him always.
Rich Forbes