Much of what is said in this article concerning the prayer life of a believer in Christ is from a book that I first read in 2006 titled, “The PAPA Prayer”, authored by Larry Crabb. Rereading this book seventeen years after I first read it, I came to realize and am grateful how my prayer life has matured in some areas, however I also realize it still needs to mature in many more aspects. As a matter of fact, there are some aspects of my prayer life that has not matured much at all.
What we need to be careful of whether or not you decide to purchase this essential book about prayer or just read this article along with the others that will follow in the upcoming weeks about prayer; what we need to understand is that prayer is not learned from memorizing a list of procedures or sequential steps to be done in order to have a meaningful prayer life that God intends us to experience in our relationship with Him. Learning how to pray is not learning a formula or techniques about prayer. What we learn about prayer mostly comes from an intimate relationship with God, the One whom we are praying to.
Some of what will be said concerning prayer in this and other articles to follow will be from the author’s personal experience of his prayer life as well as my own. What we learn about a maturing prayer life is experiential and is not just applying or practicing the principles and or the concepts of prayer that are presented.
If you were asked by someone who knows nothing about prayer to describe to them your prayer life, what would tell them? What verses in the Bible would you use that you believe would clarify to this person about what how you experience prayer in your life? The point of these two questions is that you can only describe your prayer life from your own regular expression and experience with prayer. The scriptures that you would quote would be based on how you regularly experience prayer.
When it comes to prayer in your life, what questions can you most identify with?
- Have you ever prayed to God for something but never received what you prayed for?
- Have you ever prayed to God for guidance for a difficult situation and or dealing with a difficult person but never received from Him the guidance you needed?
- Do you feel that because you have not received an answer from God about your prayers that He is not really not listening to you?
For many the only kind of prayer they know is asking God for something they need. However, there is much more about prayer we can experience in our relationship with God.
Before we pray, do we really look forward to spending time with God? Do we pray with the deep desire to get to know God more intimately? Are we really enjoying being in His presence?
When we pray is our goal and or purpose for praying only to receive from God what we need and want? On the other hand, when we pray is our goal or primary purpose to get closer to God, to get to know Him better more than getting more blessings from Him?
Please do not misunderstand me. I am not saying that when we approach God in prayer, we are never to ask Him for what we need and or even what we desire. God knows we have needs and even have desires.
- Matthew 6:7-8, “7 “When you pray, don’t babble on and on as people of other religions do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again. 8 Don’t be like them, for your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him!
- Matthew 21:22, “You can pray for anything, and if you have faith, you will receive it.”
- John 14:14, “Yes, ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it!”
- Psalms 37:4, “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.”
- Psalms 21:2, “For you have given him his heart’s desire; you have withheld nothing he requested.
One good indication that we are maturing in our prayer life is that our main purpose of prayer is more about getting closer to God than God granting our requests. This is called relational prayer. The author Lary Crabb explains what relational prayer is and does in the life of a believer in Christ. “It is a way to know God so well that the deepest desire of God’s heart actually becomes the deepest desire of ours, and that frees us to ask God for what we really want with confidence that He will move heaven and earth to grant our requests, because what we want now matches what He wants.”
When we experientially learn and practice relational prayer instead of ONLY praying asking God for what we want or need, our prayers will first focus on our relationship with God and then on our petitions or requests. “Relate and then request. Enjoy God and then enjoy His provisions.”
Again, the author explains from his experience what relational prayer does; “…it is the best way I discovered to develop and nourish the relationship with God given to me by Jesus through His life, death, and resurrection. Relational prayer provides the Spirit with a wide-open opportunity to do what He loves most to do, to draw me into the heart and life of the Father and to make me more like the Son.” Simply said, relational prayer leads to personal transformation.
Another reality of what relational prayer does in our lives is that when we pray it puts relating with God ahead of asking things from Him. We have a deeper realization and desire to know God more than just to get things from Him.
In chapter four of this book, “Get God Before Praying to Get from God”, it states that the Bible teaches us five distinct ways we can communicate with God through prayer. 1) We relate with Him. 2) We worship Him. 3) We thank Him for who He is and what He does for us. 4) We intercede for others in response to their needs. 5) And finally, we petition Him for blessings we would like Him to provide.
1) We relate with Him, or relational prayer. This is how Jesus teaches us how to pray in Matthew 6:9a, “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven…”. In other words, we are praying to our heavenly Father and acknowledging or distinguishing who He is by where He is.
2) We worship Him. As we recognize who God is, worship and praise will naturally flow from our hearts and be expressed by our words. For Pentecostals, many times this is done with our heavenly language. Acts 2:4, 11b, “4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them. 11b, we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!”
3) We thank Him for who He is and what He does for us. Our relationship with and worship of God leads us to prayers of thanksgiving or gratitude for what we have experienced in our lives of who He is and what he has done. Again, as Pentecostals, this can be done when we sing in tongues. Colossians 3:16, “Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts.”
4) We intercede for others in response to their needs. “But when relational prayer yields worship and worship produces gratitude leads us to intercede for others to know God as we have come to know Him, then we intercede “in the Spirit” with other-centered love.” Ephesians 1:18-19, 18 I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and his incomparably great power for us who believe.
5) We petition Him for blessings we would like Him to provide. Jesus taught this fact very clearly in in the last points of how He taught us to pray. Matthew 6:11-13, “11 Give us today our daily bread. 12 Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’”
When we begin to learn how to pray to get to know God more intimately and experience Him more in our relationship with Him, instead of praying to try to get things from God, we will be laying a strong foundation for maturity and spiritual growth.
Ephesians 3:16-19, New Living Translation
16 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. 18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
Pastor John
