How To Pray: For Beginners Only

How To Pray

For beginners only…

How to pray…One of my goals in my writing and speaking is to make things simple. Not simplistic. Simple. There’s a difference. In this post I’m starting a brief series on how to pray and I promise I won’t make it complicated.

Simple Is Not Simplistic

Simplistic means you dumb things down to beyond the obvious. It can be insulting.

Simple means you leave out the non-essentials so people don’t lose the main point. It shows respect to your listeners by not wasting their time.

Jesus Taught Simple Lessons

Jesus’ teaching was simple too. That’s why he used stories and analogies all the time. He wanted to make sure people understood what he was talking about. He never tried to impress people by quoting the Bible or talking theology like the other religious teachers of his day.

You can see his simple teaching in his teaching on prayer. It’s found in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7). Over the next few posts I want to walk us through his teaching on prayer. 

For Beginners Only

I’m often surprised by how many people are intimidated by prayer. They are convinced that it’s complicated… that there is a trick to it… that you have to know something special to approach God. And because of that, they are sure they are doing it wrong and so they don’t even bother with prayer.

But it’s not complicated.

If you are a “pro” at prayer, then this post may not be for you. It’s for beginners only.

Teach Us To Pray

In the book of Luke, Luke tells us this:

One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.” Luke 11:1

The John being referred to here is John the Baptist. The prophet who came before Jesus.

Jesus’ disciples admitted that they were clueless about prayer. That should encourage you. They didn’t get prayer either.

But it seemed like John understood prayer and so did John’s disciples. 

So Jesus' disciples were a little jealous and a bit surprised that Jesus hadn’t taught them to pray yet. 

Jesus obviously knew how to pray so his disciples were like, …

Come on Jesus. Help us out here. If John’s disciples know how to pray, and you know how to pray, we should too.

Jesus Teaches on Prayer

So Jesus said, Okay. Here’s the deal. I’m gonna give you a template… that is, a basic prayer that you can model all your prayers on. It's like a framework …to build your prayers around.

Prayer is Personal

Jesus gave them a simple prayer, probably unlike any prayer they had ever prayed before. He gave them a prayer that wasn’t meant to impress God or other  people but to connect with God in a personal way. 

I think that’s what we all want, isn’t it? To talk to God in a personal way?

Prayer Can Be Short

This prayer was so simple  that it only has 53 words.

That’s it. Just 53 words. 

It takes 20 seconds to pray.

Our Father in heaven, holy is your name.

May your Kingdom come. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.

Give us today the food we need, and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us.

And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one. Matthew 6:9-13

If that’s too long of a prayer, Jesus is quoted in Luke’s account with a similar prayer that’s only 34 words. (See Luke 11:2-4)

I love that because that tells me that prayer should be simple. Not complicated. It doesn’t have to be long to be meaningful. You don’t have to quote the Bible or use flowery words. And when it’s short, there’s no time to get distracted or fall asleep!

So you can breathe a sigh of relief. There’s no trick to prayer or secret formulas that you have to follow. If you can talk to a person you can talk to God.

Prayer Is Meaningful

But you should also know that there’s no benefit to praying this prayer if you don’t know what it means. It’s not an incantation. It's not magic. You don’t score any points with God simply by reciting the words. 

Some people treat the prayer like that. It's often used by people who want to pray something but have no idea what to pray so they recite this prayer even though they don't know what it means.  

When I was a kid my mom and I prayed the Lord’s prayer every night before bed.

I asked her once what it meant, and she struggled to give me an answer. 

I thought it was odd that we prayed something that she didn’t understand. Maybe that’s part of the reason I work hard to help make God and faith simple. 

So, there you go. You don’t have to be profound or theological, or long-winded when you pray. Just tell God what’s on your mind. 

What Should You Pray For?

Next week I’ll look at what the prayer means and how you can use it to guide your prayer life. So I hope you’ll come back and maybe invite a friend who struggles with prayer.

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