When it comes to prayer, it is not about your words, it's about your heart posture.
Prayer is not about making your speech eloquent to God, but rather it's about your heart to heart, one-on-one conversation with the Lord, where you give thanks, where you confess your sins, and where you exchange your will and plans for your life, for his will and plans for your life.
Prayer is freely pouring your heart out to the Lord and coming to Him as you are.
Whether that's through joy and excitement, frustration and anger, crying in your tears, whatever it is, you're able to come to Him as you are without being judged.
Now that we have the foundation set, let's get into how to actually pray.
It starts off with your environment. Matthew chapter 6, verse 6-7, talks about something called the secret place. It reads:
When you pray, go into your room and when you have shut your door, pray to your father who is in the secret place and your father who sees in secret or rewards you openly.
If you're wondering where your secret place should be or where it's supposed to be, ask yourself these questions: where is the place that will cause you the least
amount of distraction? A place that will give peace and quiet and help you to fixate your mind on God. Is it in your room with just you and your Bible? Is it on a certain pathway beside your house where you go for a walk early in the morning? Your secret place is going to set the tone for your prayer.
Jesus actually teaches us how to pray and he gives us a guideline in what we should say when we pray to the Father. This prayer is actually deeper than just a script that you have to follow. You can actually take the principles and the guideline of
this prayer that Jesus teaches and apply it to yourself. Apply it in your own words when you directly communicate with God.
Matthew 6:9 - After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father in heaven, howlow it be your name.
This is starting your prayer off, acknowledging who you're saying this prayer to. In this case, it's our holy heavenly Father. The next line, it says, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. This is us surrendering our plans and our will to the Lord. We're saying, Father God, no matter what happens, may the plans and the purpose that you have for my life be the path that I end up following.
Matthew 6:12&13 - Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors and do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from the evil for yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.
This is asking God that he provides us with what we need, not what we want, what we need for this very day. That way we can continue to depend on God's strength, wisdom, capacity throughout our day. This is also asking God to forgive us of our sins, bringing it to the Lord, sitting with him until we are fully made
clear.
When you pray, expect to hear back from God. It's a two-sided communication, so don't think you're talking to a wall. There's actually somebody there listening. That's Jesus.