Speaking to God in Prayer--Life with God Series

            When I play board games, I’m the kind of person who likes to play as an individual. If a game is designed for me to have a teammate, that’s fine—I can live with that. But sometimes, I find myself at a gathering that has 12 people, but we have a board game that only allows for four players. Now what? Some of you don’t mind just pairing up with another person, but I would rather bow out and watch everyone else play than play with someone as a team.

            The reason for that is pretty silly, to be honest—when I think I have a winning strategy, I get so stubborn that I don’t want to have to work with anyone else! They may not see the obvious superiority of my strategy, and they may have the audacity to suggest a different plan!

            Playing a board game as an individual is one thing, but there are some activities in life that simply require partnership and cooperation. Communication is definitely in that category. We’ve all been in one-sided conversations before, and we can all attest that they are a far cry from real communication. Communication truly is a two-way street; it involves sharing and receiving. If only one person is truly interested or active in a conversation, communication simply will not take place.

            In the last couple of weeks, we’ve learned that God communicates to us through the Bible. Today, we’re going to start talking about how we communicate to God, and that is through prayer. Along with obedience, prayer forms a major part of how we respond to what God communicates to us in the Bible.

            Since prayer does form a major part of our response to God, it’s just like God to give us plenty of teaching about it in the Bible. Today, we’re going to start taking a look at the model prayer that Jesus gave us which we often call “The Lord’s Prayer.” We’ll take a close look at the Lord’s lead-in to that prayer in the Sermon on the Mount, and in that lead-in we will find the roots of fruitful praying.

The Roots of Fruitful Praying

            If I had to sum it up, I would say that the roots of fruitful praying are to pray in a manner that fits with what our God is like. We must pray in a way that is befitting the kind of character that God has, as He has revealed it to us through His promises and actions. In that light, we find two attitudes in Matthew 6:7-8 that could give us a disease in the very roots of our prayer lives if we don’t watch out for them.

Diseased Attitudes About Prayer

1. God can be manipulated into answering my prayers

            Notice the warning that Jesus gives us in Matthew 6:7 – “And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words.” Let me focus here not so much on what these non-Jewish people did, but on what they thought – they thought their prayers would be heard because of their own actions. Their confidence for answered prayer was not in their god, but in whether or not they did things in the proper way.

            In this case, Jesus highlighted the practice of offering long, drawn-out prayers, but the actions could be anything. He could’ve mentioned offering the proper sacrifices or demonstrating sorrow in a visible way like cutting yourself, because those were also common practices among the Gentiles.

            This attitude toward prayer is a hallmark of false religion. There are many examples of this notion that I can make my prayers effective by my own actions. Consider the Muslim habit of prayer, for example. They believe that their prayers will be effective if they offer them at precisely the right times of day, facing the proper direction, and with the proper order of standing, kneeling, and bowing. Or we could consider Hindu practices, such as crawling for miles to a temple in order to show your sorrow over your sins.

            Whenever I start to think that I can force God’s hand by something that I do, I am catching a disease at the roots of my prayer life. Yet it’s very easy to slip into this mindset. I might think to myself, “If I just get down on my knees and stay there until my knees are raw and my back aches, then God will see how serious I am about this prayer business, and he will answer my prayer.” Or I might think, “If I can just work myself into tears about this, then God will see how desperately I desire this request, and he will give it to me.”

            I have a friend who preached at a church one time, and during the course of the service he prayed a prayer from the pulpit. After the service, the elders of that church were furious with him because he didn’t end his prayer in the way that they thought was necessary. They told him that he had to end his prayer with, “In Jesus name I pray.” They thought his prayer wouldn’t be effective with any other ending.

            My friends, let me be clear about this – when God grants us what we request, it is not because of anything we have done, but simply because of what God is like. He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness. He is willing to answer prayer because he is good, not because we have made him cry “Uncle!” by using the right postures or the right phrases.

Remembering what God is really like is the key to avoiding the second diseased attitude.

2. God needs to be convinced to care about me

            The Lord continued his teaching on prayer by saying this in verse eight: “Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” In their religions, the Gentiles had no reason to think that their gods really cared about them. Perhaps their gods kept tabs on them, but there wasn’t really a notion of personal concern or affection.

            For that reason, their prayers were more like uninvited interruptions, and if you’re going to interrupt your god and make a request, it had better be good, right? You had better speak eloquently, or you better offer lots of compliments. Or better yet, you might try to butter him up by offering some gifts or making some vows.

            But what a drastically different situation we face when we pray to the true and living God – the God of the Bible! As Jesus reminds us here, he is our Father, and one way he demonstrates that is by keeping up with our needs – anticipating them and knowing them before we even realize that we have them!

            When we go to God in prayer, we are like a weary traveler who stops at a home to ask for shelter only to find that the table has already been set for our arrival! The bedsheets have already been turned down in expectation of our visit! Prayer is not a means to convince God to care about us because he already does!

            When we feel like God needs to be convinced to care about us, the result is that we will not pray about very many things. We will consider most things to be too insignificant to merit God’s attention, so we won’t pray about them. Consequently, we will miss out on a multitude of opportunities for God to strengthen our faith by showing his faithfulness through his compassion and care.

            We know God cares about the “big” problems in our lives. We know he cares when we are diagnosed with a devastating disease, or when we receive that eviction notice – but does he still care when we’ve lost our car keys for the third time in a week and we have to get to an appointment? Should we think that we have an invitation to pray even about that, or should we feel like it would be an interruption?

            I’ve certainly had my ups and downs with battling this prayer disease, but I can tell you that when I have chosen to pray to God about the “little” things, he has so often delighted my heart by showing me that he cares. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve prayed that we could find a child’s blanky at bedtime! And you know what? We still have their blankies!

            I remember a time a few summers ago when I was briefly working for Matthew over at United Suppliers. I was driving a delivery truck, and I usually had to leave pretty early in the morning to make my deliveries. On one particular morning I arrived at the warehouse and for some reason, my key simply would not unlock the door! It was like someone had changed the lock; I just couldn’t get in.

            Because it was so early, I didn’t want to call Matthew and bother him, so I said a prayer something like this: “Lord, I really don’t want to have to bother Matthew right now, but our customers need this delivery. Would you please help me get into the building?” I don’t know if an angel came and straightened out my key or something, but I put it back in the lock, and that knob turned as if it had just been freshly oiled!

            When we fail to pray about the little things, we miss out on so many opportunities for God to show his concern and to build our faith. God cares about you, and he even cares about the little details of life. You don’t have to convince him to care, so go to him with all of your concerns.

Now that we have dismissed these diseased attitudes about prayer, we might be left asking ourselves…

What is Prayer All About?

            If prayer is not a way to make God work for me, what is it all about? If it’s not a method to convince God to care about me (since he already does!), then what is its purpose? If it’s not even a tool to inform God about my needs (since he already knows them), then what is it really for? By remembering that prayer is part of a cycle of communication, I think we can readily see one purpose.

1. It is a way to express my love to God

            Even if you know that someone loves you deeply, it’s still good to hear it again, isn’t it? And even if I’ve expressed it to my loved ones a thousand times, it’s still good for me to say it again – “I love you!” Expressing your love has an interesting way of expanding your love. When you express your love to God, it reinforces that love and builds it.

            When you pause to pray, that choice communicates that you value your relationship with God. Even if you don’t speak the words “I love you,” your actions demonstrate it. Expressing love is a healthy and vital part of any relationship, and prayer is one of the ways that you can express your love to God.

And when we think about what God wants to build in our lives, I think we can see another purpose for prayer.

2. It is a way to express and cultivate humility in my heart

            Whenever you pray to God to thank him for something or ask him for something, that act is a tacit admission that you cannot live this life on your own. Praying to God reveals that you understand your need for him; praying to him even about the little things in life demonstrates that you know you need his power and intervention every moment of the day.

            Perhaps more than anything, a lack of prayer should be seen as a symptom not of busyness or forgetfulness, but of pride. When I do not pray frequently, my actions express that I believe I can make it through most of life just fine on my own. In those moments, I am treating God more like a safety net than a shepherd, as if he is simply something for me to fall on when I’m in trouble rather than a kind master whom I have to trust for every need in my life.

            I’m starting to think that the main reason that God answers prayer is this – because prayer expresses humility, and God has promised to give grace to the humble. James and the Apostle Peter both remind us that God is opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble. Because God is good, he delights to respond with kindness and grace toward those who humbly approach him.

            Why would we ever hesitate to pray to a God like that? Why should we ever doubt whether he cares about the things that concern us? He has given us this wonderful way to express our love and our humility to him. May we not be negligent to use it!