Have you been worried or fearful about something today? Have you been stressed out? Did you lose your patience with somebody? Did you talk to your best friend or did you text them? What about… did you talk to Jesus today? It’s amazing… prayer is one of the easiest things that we can do. It has the best benefits and results but we often forget to do it. We need to make prayer a habit. What does the Bible say about prayer?
It’s mentioned 500-600 times, depending on your translation.
Philippians 4:6, “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving, let your request be known to God.”
We don’t need to worry. We just need to pray.
1 Thessalonians 5:17,. “Pray without ceasing.”
Romans 12:12, “rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.”
We should be praying all the time, basically.
Romans 8:26. “Likewise, the spirit helps us in our weakness for, we do not know what to pray as we ought, but the spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.”
It’s okay not to know the words you want to say. Just have the conversation.
James 5:16, “Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.”
We should be praying for other people and there’s power in prayer.
Matthew 21:22, “…and whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive. If you have faith.”
This means trust in God, in his power, to do what he wants to do. It also means being in alignment with the will of God. It doesn’t mean that we’re using the creator as a vending machine.
So the first thing to make prayer habit: Make it a conversation. Just start talking out loud or in your head. Talk to Him like you’re talking to someone who’s known you your whole life. God just wants to hear from you and doesn’t need fancy words or an eloquent poem. Do you keep your eyes open? Do you keep your eyes shut? Do you bow your head? Do you just look up? All of these things don’t matter. Just keep it simple and make it as sincere and genuine as you can. Talk about the good things, the bad things, the hard things. Tell stories, ask for help. Ask for wisdom, ask for change. Thank him. Praise him, complain, question, cry…. He wants you to seek his help.
Second: Tap into your daily routine: morning, lunch, evening dinner, driving, brushing your teeth, exercising, taking a shower. Find the things that you are naturally doing every day and just make God a part of it. Read the Bible and pray. Wash your hands for 20 seconds and pray. Shampoo and pray., Run or walk and pray.
Third, take advantage of time. Use time as your trigger to pray. Traditionally, we’ve always been told to pray before meals. What a great opportunity to stop and pray. It can be a daily thing for you. But don’t just stop there. Look for other things. Maybe you can use: a stoplight. standing in line, the elevator, the escalator, arriving early to a place, waiting on a plane, a train, a show, a class, a meeting, or even church services to start. Use the time in the car, when you see an accident, when you see a homeless person, when you see a Chick-Fil-A or whatever you want to use to trigger that conversation. Weave in those short, conversational moments all day long as the scripture tells us to be in constant in prayer.
Fourth, make a prayer list. If you don’t know what to say, make a list of people that need prayer for healing or encouragement or comfort or praise. Right down the relationships in your life that are strained, things you worry about, things you’re struggling with personally or at work. Or maybe write down something to do with a goal or habit that you want to achieve or the things you hear or see in the news. Write down the things you want to make sure that you’re having a conversation with God. Use your prayer list as a reference, as an agenda, as a way for you not to forget something that’s going to be important to pray about. But you can also use it as a way to track what’s happening and how God may be answering that prayer or as a prayer journal.
There are plenty of other things out there that you can do to make prayer a daily part of your life. Just ask Jesus to help you find out which one that you really should focus on to help improve your faith journey. Prayer can really rock your world, but it requires you to initiate it. So what are you waiting on? Start talking to God right now.
