One of the unique aspects to Christianity that separates it from religions is the fact that you enter into a personal relationship with Yahweh, the creator of all things. You have direct access to the true Living God. Our access is via our prayer life. We don’t need to visit a priest of human mediator to talk to God. That is what prayer is. Communication between man and God. We can approach the Father in the name of the Son Jesus, via the power of the Holy Spirit that lives inside every Christian. Prayer is a holy communion and an opportunity to talk to and interact with our heavenly Father. It is one of the key foundations to a healthy relationship with God. Any healthy relationship needs open communication. Our walk with God is no different.
I believe one of the biggest issues with prayer these days is the increasing influence instant gratification has on our lives. We’re in the age of text messaging and online interactions. We want a response now and we don’t have the patience to wait around for it. It needs to be what we want to hear when we want to hear it. A Christians’ prayer life isn’t always that way. I’d more often than not it’s an act of patience. God’s answer will come, in His time, and in His way. It may or may not be the answer we want to hear, but it will be the answer we need to hear. Our Father in heaven has our best interests in mind. We may not understand that in the moment, but He provides and denies things to us out of His goodness. If we do not have our trust squarely in His omniscient and loving nature, we will allow our selfish nature to drive a wall between our relationship. Our Father wants us to reach out to Him in all of our situations. Scripture tells us this time and time again. 16Rejoice always; 17pray without ceasing; 18in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Jesus Christ (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18). Another example. 4Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! 5Let your gentle spirit be know to the all men. The Lord is near. 6Be anxious for nothing, but with everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be known to God. 7And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:4-7). I remember a specific time in my life when I was pouring myself out to God with so many questions. I’d been a Christian for a few years and what I was seeing in the church was very frustrating to me. I was reading my bible and the scriptures I were reading were not evident in the lives of the people I was around. We’re supposed to be Christ centered. Servants to the God Almighty to help spread His word of salvation to others. We help bring into the fold the lost and lonely souls that do not know Jesus. Just as Jesus told the parable of the shepherd who would leave the 99 to go find the 1 missing sheep. What I was seeing in the church was a group of people more interested in gaining status within the church, as an organization. The people I talked to gave no acknowledge of Christ moving in their lives. It was one accomplishment after another with no glory given to the Lord. It was more important to push the name of the church I was attending over the gospel of Jesus Christ. It had gotten to point where shirts were being made that stated “I love my Church.” There was very little mention of Jesus in all of this activity. This all lead me to stop attending church for 6 – 12 months. It all made no sense to me. Adding fuel to the fire, my job was getting increasingly more stressful. The plant I worked at was over loaded with work. A lot better than having no work for sure, but it brought on another set of issues. We were several months behind on orders, and our customers were of course angry. I was one of the primary contacts between production and our customers. So I had to deal with a lot it personally. To add to this, I’ll was taking care of a lot of responsibilities of one of our salesman. Dennis was usually a couple weeks late when following up on customer related issues, so I was the one filling the gap. Well, one day my manager came in and I was talking to him about the enter situation and trying to get some solutions figured out to our problems. My manager’s solution was to lie to our customers about our situation. This was the tipping point for me. As he walked out of the door, I remember thinking to myself, that’s it man. I’m done. I’m going to quit. This is insane. No one gives a crap about what is going on here. Well enter God’s timing. My phone rings, and I answer it. It’s the last person I wanted to talk at that moment in time. Salesman Dennis. He was calling to ask me about a customer order. He stops and asks me if I have time to hear a story about something that just happened to him. In my head I’m screaming, no freaking way man, I don’t have time for this, crap, but I said sure. I was like, did I just say that? Anyway, Dennis starts telling me about his daughter’s childhood friend Devon. Turns out Devon became transgender while at college and came over to his house for the holidays. The entire time I’m like what does this have to do with anything? Well that’s when he said, “As a Christian….” I had no idea he was a brother in Christ. I’d never thought to ask or ever talked about it. Anyway, he goes on to say that he’s known Devon since she was a little girl. Devon grew up with his daughter. He’s always loved Devon like a daughter as well. Now Devon had transitioned, there were a lot of Christians saying to him how could he put up with that? Dennis went on to talk to me about areas in the Bible where Jesus calls us to seek our the lowly and lost. How he came for the sick and not the self righteous. How Jesus ate with the sinners and outcasts. How the angels appeared to the lowliest people in their society, they shepherds. As a Christian Dennis is called to love everyone, even his enemies. He told me how he still loved Devon as he would a daughter, and based on what the Holy Spirit taught him, he should be. He doesn’t condone the lifestyle, but he can still love the person. It was like a bomb went off in my head. All of the scriptures he went through were the ones that I was asking God about. As His word tells us one thing, and people are acting in complete contrast to it. After that call all the stress, anxiety, and anger I had about my situation vanished. Lisa, our administrative assistant shared an office with me. She looked at me and saw the tears in my eyes. She asked me what happened? I told her, I can’t believe it. God used Dennis, the last person I would have wanted to talk to right now, to answer every prayer I’ve been asking Him about for the past 6-8 months. I went about my duties at work with a completely different perspective. I rejoiced in my relationship with the Lord. His presence gave me the patience and desire to endure the situations at work. He’d always been there, for sure, but I was letting my frustrations and perspective get in the way of me enjoying His presence.
God’s timing in answering prayer is amazing. Like any relationship, it is up to us to keep our hearts in a condition to hear from the Lord. 15O Lord, open my lips, that my mouth may declare Your praise. 16For you do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it; You are not pleased with burnt offering. 17The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise (Psalms 51-15-17). The saving grace of the gospel keeps us humble. It keeps our hearts in a state of grateful longing. We will desire to be in presence of God, and will seek Him out. We do this not only in our prayer life but also by reading the bible, the word of God. John 17 is a prayer from Jesus to the Father praying for His disciples and giving thanks to God for being able to fulfil the will of God on earth. Jesus talks about how the Son and Father are one, and how Jesus’ disciples are also so one in the Father and Son through the name of Jesus. Jesus, doesn’t stop there, He also includes the unity through the Holy Spirit to all that will believe through the gospel that will be proclaimed to the world. 13 But now I come to You; and these things I speak in the world so that they may have My joy made full in themselves. 14 I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 15 I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but keep them from the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them on the truth; Your word is truth. 18 As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. 19 For their sakes I sanctify Myself, they they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. 20 “I do not as on behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; 21 that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so the the world may believe that You send Me” (John 17: 13-21 NASB1995). We are brought into a union with of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit through our salvation. This gives us access to God through Jesus Christ, maintained by the Holy Spirit. This is reinforce in Matthew 8 when Jesus was approached my a centurion, a Roman military commander. 5 And when Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him, imploring Him, 6 and saying, “Lord, my servant is lying paralyzed at home, fearfully tormented.” 7 Jesus *said to him, “I will come and heal him.” 8 But the centurion said, “Lord, I am not worthy for You to come under my roof, but just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For I also am a man under authority, with soldiers under me; and I say to this one, ‘Go!’ and he goes, and to another, ‘Come!’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this!’ and he does it.” 10 Now when Jesus heard this, He marveled and said to those who were following, “Truly I say to you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel. 11 I say to you that many will come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; 12 but the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 13 And Jesus said to the centurion, “Go; it shall be done for you as you have believed.” And the servant was healed that very moment (Matthew 8″ 5-13 NASB1995). This exchange shows the hierarchy of prayer. We pray to the Father, in the name of Jesus, and the answers of the Father are given to Jesus, our high priest, and communicated or carried out to us or whoever is the recipient of that prayer by the Holy Spirit. Through this relation with the Father through Jesus, how awesome is it to be able to prayer for the needs of others and know that our prayers and petitions will be heard by our Father in heaven! It is because of this that I include a written prayer and the end of each chapter. A prayer that people can pray to God in the name of Jesus. When we pray to God for others, we can ask for His mercy and His compassion to be poured out for others. How wonderous and glorious the God we serve. As Paul taught in his letter to the Thessalonians, 14 We urge you, brethren, admonish the unruly, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with everyone. 15 See that no one repays another with evil for evil, but always seek after that which is good for one another and for all people. 16 Rejoice always; 17 pray without ceasing; 18 in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus (1Thessalonians 14-18 NASB1995). We can pray to God on behalf of all people. We can approach God with praise and petitions always. What a great way to reach out to people that we may not even be in touch with, or that we may not even know. Someone broken down on the highway, or even that person that was driving like a maniac. A prayer for the safety of that driver and the people around them. As Christians we have opportunities to reach people for Christ every moment of every day through our prayer life.
Prayer is not only about asking God for things. Prayer is our path of communication with our Father. He is a good Father. As Jesus told us, none are good expect Father God. Christianity is a relationship with God through the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ. Our love and trust in Christ humbles our heart to the presence of the Lord. There are times the Holy Spirit will direct us to pray. it maybe for someone else, or God may want to teach us about Himself. When the Lord asks us to pray, we need to be obedient to his requests, no matter the circumstance. No matter how silly it may seem at the time. I was living with a friend of mine after I moved back from New York, shortly after I was saved. Jake was out of town visiting family one weekend, 2-3 hours away. I don’t remember exactly what I was doing, but I went into the garage looking for something. As I walked into the garage I closed the door from the kitchen behind me, and locked myself out of the house. Not really sure how I did that either, but so it goes. I figured I’d walk over to the neighbors and see if they had a spare key. There wasn’t much else I could do that that point, my phone and everything was inside. Jake wasn’t due back home until the next day. So I knocked on the neighbor’s door, but no one answered. It was night time, I don’t remember the exact time, so I figured they must be in bed. I walked back into the garage and closed the bay door and say down on the weight lifting bench trying to figure out what I could do. That’s when I heard the voice in my head say, pray. I thought to myself, pray? Prayer isn’t going to magically open this door, but ok fine I’ll pray. So I prayed “Heavenly Father I don’t want to be stuck in this garage all night. Can you please let me in the house? If not, no big deal, I can just sleep on this weight bench tonight. In Jesus name, Amen”. As soon I finished my prayer I thought to myself, “I bet Amaha will be awake now, I can just sleep on his couch”. So I went back to my neighbor’s house and knocked on the door again. To my surprise no one answered, so much for that prayer. So I went back into the garage, and sat back down on the weight bench, coming to terms with sleeping in the garage for the night. It wasn’t ten or fitteen minutes later that Jake pulled into the driveway. It blew me away. Jake decided to come home early, unbeknownst to me. This wasn’t some kind of miracle. Jake wasn’t instantaneously transported back home because of my prayer. My obedience in prayer allowed God to show something about Himself. God is with us always through the presence of the Holy Spirit. This situation was to teach me that. No matter how small the situation may be God is with us. He sees what we are going through, and He cares about us as His children. God knew Jake was coming home when I locked myself out. Sure, He could have just let things roll along, staying silent and just letting them work out, but He choose to let me experience His relationship with me in that situation to increase my trust and dependence on Him. I had a part to play in this relationship. I had a choice in that moment, I could have chose not to pray. I could have dismissed the request, but thankfully I was obedient, and received the blessing of learning something about Father God in the process.
My prayer for this chapter will be sharing a prayer a friend of mine shared with me years ago. Talking about being obedient to what God is asking us to do in our prayer lives, I feel that this prayer is the perfect fit to this chapter. Kristen wrote this prayer while on a plane flying out of town for business. She sent me a screen shot of it via text. She said she wasn’t sure why, but she felt God was telling her to share it with me. I don’t even remember if writing down a prayer was something she normally did, but this prayer was exactly want I needed at that time in my life. I was praying to God about areas of my life that seemed out of my control, and I needed reminding of what God taught me in that garage. Kristen’s obedience in prayer brought peace to my anxiety. One, knowing that I wasn’t the only person struggling with the issue. Two, that God was gracious in asking someone to be an answer to my prayer in my time of need. I am hoping through this book that same blessing can reach even more people.
