Luke 6:12

 

How important is prayer to a believer! I don’t think you’ll find anybody who prayed quite so much as Jesus did. The Lord was somebody (as God in the form of man) who perhaps didn’t need to pray at all, and yet we find time and time again, that he found a quiet place to pray and spend time in God’s presence. How much more should we do this! There is a tremendous resource to be found in prayer. Prayer really works. It’s a direct link to God, an emergency line that goes straight to the one who upholds all things by the word of His power. At the end of James, you really get how we should prayer and what we should pray for. 

 

Does any one among you suffer evil? let him pray. Is any happy? let him sing psalms. Is any sick among you? let him call to [him] the elders of the assembly, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of [the] Lord; and the prayer of faith shall heal the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he be one who has committed sins, it shall be forgiven him. Confess therefore your offences to one another, and pray for one another, that ye may be healed. [The] fervent supplication of the righteous [man] has much power.

 

What James is basically saying there is, no matter what happens commit everything to God. Something not gone right? Pray about it? Something amazing happened? Pray and give thanks about it. It’s God who has provided the experience you are going through, commit it to Him. How? By prayer!

 

God is interested in any problem, no matter how small. Somebody once said that God isn’t interested in the small little problems of a Christian, but that’s so wrong! That’s exactly the sort of thing that God is interested in! 

 

We should commit everything to God, but how often we don’t. There is an old hymn that goes like this: 

 

O what peace we often forfeit,

O what needless pain we bear,

All because we do not carry

Everything to God in prayer.

 

And sometimes, even when we do pray we still worry!

 

There is a story of a boy who broke his toy train. He was very upset about this, and cried and cried and cried. Eventually his Grandpa said he could fix it, so the old man took it to his shed and began fixing it. The boy watched as the skill hands began to make the train work again. But as the minutes turned to hours and the train was still not ready, the boy grew impatient. Eventually he could wait no longer and snatched the train back and began to play with it again. Unfortunately because the train had not been repaired completely, it broke again. What a silly boy!

 

But wait, aren't we the same? We pray to God about a worry we have, but then continue to worry about it! We snatch it back and try and fix the problem ourselves, usually making the issue worse. Leave things in God’s hands once you’ve committed things to him in prayer!

 

Read Luke 17:11-17

 

We should give thanks to God for answered prayer. We often pray lots before an event we are worried about. Maybe an exam or something, but how much time do we spend afterwards praying about it and thanking God for helping us? Probably half the time at best!

I think it’s a good habit to get into, at the end of each day to find at least one thing to thank God for. You’ll soon become aware of the many blessings God loves to give you on a daily basis. God would always be looking for a response for his love and blessing towards us. When God brings us through a tough time, what is our response? a quick ‘Thanks’ and then get on with our lives? If I’m honest, that probably sums me up. God would look for worship to flow out from our experiences in life!

 

We should never go too long without prayer either, when the Lord was a child, His parents lost Him on the way back from a journey to Jerusalem. They didn’t realise until a few days later as there were many people in their group. How many days do we go before we realise that we haven’t talked to Jesus? 

 

Finally, Read Isaiah 6:1-7

 

These verses give a good sense of God’s power, holiness and majesty. We should never forget who we are praying too! While it is true, we can’t be bought closer to the Father than to be His sons, and we can’t be closer to the Lord than to be bride and we can’t be closer to the Spirit than to have Him indwell us, and even though we have a brand new relationship with God and have boldness to enter his presence, we should never forget we are talking to God Himself.

 

That’s why when we talk to God, we say

 

GOD and Father

 

LORD Jesus

 

HOLY Spirit

 

These a divine persons, people of honour and majesty, and they need to be spoken to in a reverent and honourable way. How easy it is, at night when we pray to drift off to slip, or to have your mind wander to other things. I think if we realised who we are praying to, we would be much more diligent in our prayer lives!

 

Prayer is a great resource, but quite often an under-utilised one as well. God wants to talk to you and wants to have that close relationship with you. Will you do your bit, by praying regularly and enthusiastically about anything you have happen in your life? You will be amazed by God’s response!