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I want to start off by telling you, there’s really no wrong way to pray. The only wrong way to pray is to, really, never pray at all.
With that said, I do think that many of us may carry a very narrow view of what prayer really is. We may view prayer (only) as a time where we come before God and start asking for things; sometimes even making prayer time transactional and bargaining. That is a part of prayer, for sure. How many of us (even those who may not be Christian) have turned to prayer out of desperation? But prayer goes deeper than us requesting for some heavenly assistance.
If we limit prayer to only asking God for stuff, the urging of “pray continually” may be really difficult to fathom and more difficult to practice.
The shape of prayer
There is a beautiful phrase I have learned: Lex orandi, Lex credendi, Lex vivendi. Loosely translated, it means: how we pray shapes how we believe, which shapes how we live.
If we limit prayer to a transactional act it may end up giving us a narrow and limited view of God. After all, the way we pray affects how we believe.
The Rev. Adam Hamilton once said, “breathing is to the body as prayer is to the soul.” Prayer is not just something we do before we consume a meal or something turn to when there’s a pop quiz in a class we’re already struggling in or a time to make a plea bargain after breaking your parent’s prized vase. Again, asking for “help” is a very important part of prayer, but there’s more to praying than simply asking for help. Prayer, in a nutshell, is how we communicate with God.
Communication is an integral part of a healthy relationship. It’s a skewed relationship if one party only communicates when they want/need something from the other.
In prayer, we commune with God. We thank God. We praise God. We bless God. We adore God. We confess to God. We ask help from God. But also, prayer is not just limited to us talking.
Listening is a very important part of communication in a relationship--and that applies to prayer as well. Sometimes, sitting in silence, contemplatively listening for that thin quiet sound (I Kings 19:12b, CEB) is all the prayer we need.
When it comes to speaking to God, s speak the way you would speak to the person who is closest to you. Be honest. Be raw. Be angry. Lament, if you have to. Cry. Grieve. Be joyous. Offer gratitude. Offer blessings and praise and adoration. Ask for forgiveness. Ask for wisdom and guidance. Sit in silence surrounded by the presence of God.
Set aside a time for intentional prayer. Or pray on your walk. Pray when you’re stopped in traffic. Pray while doing the dishes. Offer a blessing when you witness something beautiful in nature.
Prayerful living
Prayer like this might feel very awkward at first. It feels like you’re having a conversation with yourself and you can become very self-aware of how “silly” this may all seem and feel. But the more you pray, the more natural it becomes.
Jesus found it important to pray and if it was important to Jesus, it is important to us. I believe that prayer sustained Jesus and his ministry. I believe that his prayer life gave him strength, refreshed and renewed him in his ministry, and most importantly, it helped him stay in tune with God.
Jesus modeled an intimate relationship with God, and I feel that this intimacy had a lot do with how much time he spent in prayer.
The more we pray, the less we become preoccupied by the “success rate” of prayer (how often our prayers may be answered). After all, prayer is less about changing God’s mind--as Kierkegaard said: “The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.”
If you’re a seasoned vet in prayer, keep praying. If you’re new to this, keep praying until it becomes like second nature to you. Continue to commune and communicate with God.
May you see that prayer is more than just something we do here and there; something more than just a laundry list of requests. But that prayer is a way of living. So may we pray continually.
Joseph Yoo is the author When the Saints Go Flying in. He is a West Coaster at heart contently living in Houston, Texas with his wife and son. He serves at Mosaic Church in Houston. Find more of his writing at josephyoo.com.
