Trailblazin Ministries: Prayer God's Way: The Disciple's Prayer

Prayer God's Way: The Disciple's Prayer - Part 1

Written by LaRosa Johnson
Thursday, 20 December 2007

Introduction

We are currently going through a series titled "Read.Pray.Worship.Live," where we are looking at how each of these aspects is integral to the life of the believer and necessary in order to remain in proper fellowship with the Lord. In our first study, we began with a look at the Westminster Catechism, which informed us that the chief end of man is to glorify God. In our study, A Heart to Study God's Word, we found that one of the most important ways for us to glorify God is through a dedicated and systematic studying of the Scriptures, which is the means by which we will come to know who God is and how we are to properly worship Him. In the next segment of our study, we want to take a look at another means by which we can glorify God and grow in intimacy with Him; the topic for this study is prayer. In this particular study, we will set out to look at the reasons for prayer and a model of prayer as outlined by Jesus Christ on two separate occasions.

To begin this study, it would first be appropriate for us to define prayer and find out exactly what it is for the Christian. The American Heritage Dictionary defines prayer as the following: 1) a reverent petition made to God... or 2) an act of communication with God... such as devotion, confession, praise, or thanksgiving. If we look at the Holman Bible Dictionary, we see that prayer "involves the dialogue between God and people." If we were to combine these definitions, we would then be able to define prayer as a dialogue with God where we both communicate and make our petitions known to Him. This is the definition that we will be working with as we examine why and how we are to pray.

Why Do We Pray?

For a study on prayer, the first question is a very logical one: why should we pray? If we look at Scripture with the intent of finding an answer, we will soon discover a myriad of reasons as to why we are to pray. For the purpose of this particular study, we'll briefly examine eight reasons why we are to pray as outlined in Bill Bright's work How You Can Pray With Confidence, which I have briefly expounded upon.

We pray because God commands us to pray. If we look at the New Testament alone, we will find several commands of prayer. Pray continually (1 Thess. 5:17). Watch and pray (Luke 21:36). Pray with thanksgiving (Philippians 4:6, Col. 4:2). Pray in the Spirit (1 Cor. 14:15). Always pray and not give up (Luke 18:1). Pray for those in authority (1 Tim. 2:2). Pray for boldness (Acts 4:29). And so many more...
We pray because of Jesus' example. If we were to closely examine the gospels, we would find that Jesus was very dedicated to prayer and spending time alone with His Father. We see Him several times in Scripture going off by Himself to pray (Luke 5:16 & Matt. 14:23) as well as praying for others (John 17). Jesus was dependent on His prayer life, so how much more should we pray and spend time with God!
We also pray because of the example of the disciples and others in Scripture. All throughout Scripture we find God's people praying to Him, especially with the disciples and early church. These are definite examples of how we should be spending our prayer time.
We pray so that we can have fellowship with God. He anxiously and patiently waits for us to come to Him in prayer. Proverbs tells us that "the prayer of the upright is His delight" (Proverbs 15:8), which is something that should be the motivation of every believer; we should desire for our prayers to be a delight to the Lord. We should desire to spend time with God so that we can please and delight Him.
We pray so that we can communicate with God. One thing that we have to realize as Christians is that we have a direct line of communication with God because of our position as His children. God has made Himself available to us at all times. It is through prayer that we can talk and make our petitions known to God; He then responds to us through His written Word, the Holy Bible, as we study it.
We also pray so that we can receive spiritual nurture & nourishment (Psalm 119:50). Just like eating, we too have to spend time in prayer with the Lord to keep our spirits healthy and alive. Just like if we don't eat, our bodies will become weak and frail; if we do not pray, our spirit will become weak and we then lose the strength to live as a witness for Christ.
Another reason we pray is to obtain results. If we are to use Scripture as our standard and example, we will find that prayer does indeed change things. Therefore, we can expect for those who pray to have things change around them according to the will of God. The prayers of faithful Spirit-filled believers have proven this to be true many times, and it still holds true today. For a small sampling of this, see: Genesis 25:21; Judges 6:39-40; 1 Kings 18:37-38; Acts 12:5, 16; 16:25-31.
The final reason we are to pray is because it allows for us to become a fruitful witness for Christ. Scripturally, we are to talk to God about men first, and then talk to men about God. Witnessing and evangelism should be outward displays of our prayer life. See Acts 10 for an example of how Peter was in prayer and was instructed towards an evangelism encounter.

Now, this was only a quick summary, but its purpose is to show you just how important the command to pray is. There is a scriptural command from God for us to pray, and we see that there are many spiritual benefits to prayer. By no means is this an exhaustive list, but it does lay for us the foundation by which we can prove that we do indeed need to pray, as believers.

When Should We Pray?

Since we now have an understanding of why we are to pray, the next question should seem rather obvious. When should we pray? In some regards, this seems like a silly question; but in all actuality, it is one that is worth asking and answering. Seriously, most Christians do not really understand when they are to pray, so let's look at the Scripture to find our answer.

The first passage that I want us to look at is Mark 1:35 which reads, "Now in the morning, having risen a long while before daylight, He went out and departed to a solitary place; and there He prayed." If we are to use this as our basis, the first time we are to pray is early in the morning, before we get our day started. Why should prayer be our primary agenda in the morning? Well, quite honestly, it shouldn't be any other way. The reason that prayer should be the first thing we do in the morning is so that we can seek the Lord and be in tune with the Holy Spirit; we want for Him to be able to guide and direct us throughout our entire day. We also see other examples in the Bible where God's people started their morning in prayer to Him. A few examples would include: Psalm 5:3; 88:13; 119:147. Just as it was true for these believers, the same thing needs to be true of us; we need to seek the Lord and fellowship with Him first thing in the morning so that we are in the right frame of mind and walking in the Spirit before tackling the events of the day.

The next time we are instructed to pray is in the evenings. Our model for this is found in Matthew 14:23 and it reads, "And when He [Jesus] had sent the multitude away, He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray. Now when evening came, He was alone there." Another instance can even be found in Mark 6:46-47. We first see that Jesus started His day by praying before the sunrise, and now we see Him ending His day with prayer as well. We can even find times where Jesus was up all night praying, which we can find in Luke 6:12 and while in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:36-46). There are also numerous instances outside of the life and ministry of Jesus where we see God's people praying at night, including: Psalm 119:148 and Acts 16:25. Why is that? The reason Jesus and other believers ended their day in prayer is because they wanted to end it the same way it began: in communication with the Father. Again, why? They knew that if they ended the day with prayer, thoughts of the Father would be the last thing on their mind before resting for the evening. By praying in the evening, it also allows your spirit to continue in communication and worship while you are asleep, so that the Lord is the first thing on your mind in the morning when you wake up, thus starting the process all over again for a new day.

It doesn't just end with morning & evening prayer! We also find other times of prayer in Scripture. Let's look at two passages in particular beginning with Luke 5:16. This passage reads, "So He Himself [Jesus] often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed." The second passage is 1 Thessalonians 5:17 which reads, "pray without ceasing." A few more passages would include: Psalm 55:17; Daniel 6:10; Acts 3:1; 10:30. It should be evident after reading these passages that prayer is something that we should always be doing, whether it be morning, noon, or night. We see here that Jesus prayed often, as well as others who closely followed the Lord. Now, Luke 5:16 does not tell us when Jesus prayed, but it does tell us that He got by Himself often so that He could pray without interruption. Then we see Paul commanding us to pray without ceasing in 1 Thess 5:17. If combine these two passages together and begin to build a doctrinal understanding of prayer, we see that prayer is something that should be an intricate part of our lives, even throughout the rigors of everyday life. God desires for us to be so intimate with Him that we should be seeking Him for every decision that we make, which would require for us to communicate with Him throughout the day. There should be moments throughout our day when we are offering up a quick prayer for others, giving the Lord thanks & praise, and just sharing what is on our minds. Prayer should second nature to us.

So, what answer would we give if asked when should we pray? Our answer should be: 1) intimate prayer and fellowship with the Father early in the morning when we first arise, 2) constant communication with Him throughout the day, and 3) meeting with Him again in the evening for another time of intimate prayer and fellowship. By doing that, we are insuring that we have a healthy prayer life and spending adequate time with the Lord so that we might come to know Him better and bring glory to His name.

How Do We Pray?

Now that we know why and when we pray, we now reach the greatest question we will face during this study on the subject. The question is this: how do we pray? To answer this question, we will again turn to Jesus Christ and follow His example. In two instances recorded in Scripture, Jesus taught His disciples a model to be used for prayer. The first instance is recorded in Matthew 6 during Jesus' Galilean ministry while teaching His Sermon on the Mount, and the second is found in Luke 11 during His Judean and Perean ministry after being approached by His disciples about how to properly pray. This model is important for us to have a proper understanding of how to pray. Why is it so important? If Jesus felt the need to discuss and teach it more than once with His disciples, then it is something worth taking the time to examine and study. To really get a full understanding of Jesus' prayer model, we will use the passage found in Matthew 6:9-13, but we will also look at the verses both preceding & following this passage, as well as paralleling it with the passage in Luke 11:2-4.

We will begin by starting with Matthew 6:5. It is here that Jesus starts off by warning His followers to not be like the hypocrites when they are praying. Jesus tells them how these men love to stand outside the synagogues and on the street corners praying to God, but He is completely against this. Jesus' words to them were to go their room and shut the door so that they could be alone with God, instead of out in the open for everyone to see. Why is this? Jesus tells us in Matt 6:6; those who pray out in the open receive their reward from man by being seen, but the ones who pray in private are the ones who are openly rewarded by the Lord for their persistence in prayer. The point that Jesus is trying to drive home is that prayer is not intended to be for show or public display, but is something that is of a private matter, thus it should be both taken seriously and done out of the sight/hearing of others. Prayer is meant to be a time where we pour out our heart before the Lord, and something so serious and intimate should be done in a private and intimate setting where no one else is around to hear the prayer. Another aspect worth pointing out regarding Matt 6:6 is that Jesus is not giving a specific location for prayer (as He Himself did not have an inner room in which to go and prayer), but instead is speaking of the single-mindedness that we are to have when we enter into prayer, blocking out everything that would distract from our prayers to God. In this regard, Jesus always practiced what He preached since He was one to constantly get away to pray both in the mornings and evenings, as we saw in the passages above.

The next thing that Jesus points out before getting into the prayer model is that we are to not use vain repetitions in our prayers (Matt 6:7). He reminded His listeners how the pagans constantly repeated their prayers and chants with the hope that their gods would hear and answer their petitions. This was all part of a ritualistic nature and they hoped by their many words that they would be heard and be found acceptable in the sight of their false gods and idols. In contrast, this is nothing that Christians need to do with the one true God. When we pray, the Lord hears our prayers; therefore we do not need to use any sort of repetitions and constantly repeat ourselves. There is no good that will come from the Christian constantly repeating a set of empty words with the hopes that they will somehow be rewarded for the length of the prayer. We can also find many passages in Scripture that coincide with this line of thought and show how God is not pleased by our many words. Ecclesiastes 5:2 and Matthew 23:14 are two passages where we are instructed to be of few words, especially in our prayers. Along with that, there are many examples throughout the Scripture where we can find prayers that were no more than a few words, including: 1 Kings 18:36-37; 1 Chronicles 4:10; Luke 23:34, 42; and Acts 7:60, just to name a few.

In the following verse (Matt 6:8), we find Jesus declaring that God knows all about our needs before we even come to Him in prayer, which is another reason altogether why we do not need to use these vain repetitions. It is interesting to note that Jesus has this as His last statement of caution before giving the model prayer to His followers, and there is much that we can take away from this verse as well. One of the most important things that we can take away from this verse, concerning our prayers, is that prayer is not ultimately about us telling God what we need. Martin Luther had a very enlightening comment concerning prayer when he said, "By our praying... we are instructing ourselves more than we are him." That is to say, through prayer, we are preparing ourselves to walk in the ways of the Lord more than we are attempting to tell God what to do on our behalf. Along with that, we understand, from what we have already outlined above, that God wants to hear from us in prayer, so our prayer times become a time of sharing with God, even though He already knows all of the things we have need of; therefore, prayer becomes more of a help to us, than it is having God act on our behalf, which sums up what Luther had stated.

There is more that we can understand from Matthew 6:8, and one those things is our motive for prayer. Just like we saw in verses 5-6, Jesus is instructing His followers to have pure motives for prayer. It is only when we have pure motives that we can be confident that God will hear and answer our requests made to Him. It is for this reason that we need not use vain repetitions, since we know that God already knows what we have need of before asking. We simply need to make our requests known to God (John 14:13) and we can rest knowing that He has heard us, without having to endlessly repeat our petitions.

It is after these warnings that Jesus then gives His model for how we should pray. For this study, we will look at each verse of the prayer individually. By doing this, we will afford ourselves the opportunity to look closely at what Jesus is teaching us in each portion of the prayer model. One thing to note before moving forward is that this prayer is not meant to be recited as is, but is meant to be used as a model and skeleton outline for coming to the Lord in prayer.