We Talk to God in Prayer

is equal to a magic incantation or an entrancing mantra by which the person who prays elevates himself to a higher consciousness. Prayers themselves do not make the people who pray righteous. Prayers themselves do not change the hearts and souls of the people who pray. God alone does.

    Prayer is not a religious activity which especially impresses God. For one thing, when people pray, they must not think that they are doing God a favor. God does not need their prayers. They need to pray. For another thing, when people pray, they must not be full of self-congratulation for the effort, as if their prayers gain for them some credit or merit. When people seek the praise of men for their prayer, that is all they will receive (Matt 6:5). And even more perilous, when people seek the favor of God for their prayer, they are practicing a gospel of works.

    We should also mention that many people hold to the view that prayer has little real value. For them, prayer seems like a weak thing to do, sort of a last resort to be tried when nothing else works. That distortion springs out of hearts that are self-confident and earthly centered rather than God-confident and heavenly centered.

    Remember, prayer is talking to God Almighty. We should not expect a man's words to have any special power or value. And they do not. Also, we should expect God alone to have all the wisdom and power needed to meet the needs of those who pray. And He does.

    Because people are sinners, ego, self-centeredness, worldly desire and a trust in self are closely bound to their minds and hearts and distort their view of prayer. Therefore, we must put aside any man-centered or earthly ideas of prayer in our attempt to think about prayer as accurately and clearly as possible.

Love

    Prayer is rooted in love, God's love for His people and their love in response to Him (Psalm 116:1,2, Eph. 2:4,5,18, I John 4:19). Before someone is saved, he is God's enemy. He is headed for hell and deserves the wrath that is certain to descend upon all unbelievers at the end of time. Fear and hatred grip the hearts of all people who are faced with the reality of such a destiny. But the hearts of God's people beat with a different emotion. They have a love that was given to them when they were saved, a love for Him who would not even spare His own Son in order to rescue them from hell. Above all else, prayer is sustained by a heart that loves God, for all that He is and all that He has done to and for sinners (John 3:16, Rom. 5:8, 8:32).

    The bond of love between God and His people explains a lot about the nature of prayer. Let us see how this is so by asking the following questions, "How would you feel if someone you thought was your friend never showed any interest in talking to you nor cared much to hear what you had to say? What kind of a relationship would that be? In fact, would that person really be behaving as your friend at all?" That kind of freindship certainly would not be a relationship based upon love. Two-way conversation is expected between people who claim to care for each other. Similarly, conversation is expected between God and someone who claims to be His friend (John 15:13-15, James 2:23). This dialogue is expected. In fact, it is necessary for maintaining a strong and growing bond of loving friendship.

    If we see prayer from the rather simple point of view that it is part of a conversation between friends, then we can be more comfortable as we approach God. When we wonder about prayer, we must understand that we are not called to seek the secret to some mysterious rite. Rather we believers are called to speak to God as we would to someone who loves to hear what we have to say because He loves us. Whatever we want to say, whenever we want to say it, God delights to hear. Amazing!

Humbleness

    People are creatures, totally dependent creatures, who exist and continue to live only because God made and sustains them. It is amazing that the dust of the earth can have a conversation with God who is Almighty God (Genesis 2:7, Job 10:9, 21:15). Therefore, a person who prays must pray humbly before such an Almighty Creator (Rev. 4:11, 5:12), always recognizing who he is and who God is.

    Not only are people creatures, but also they are wicked, rebellious creatures. The fact that God wants sinners to speak to Him is grace.

Their prayers should fall back upon them as dead leaves which blow in the wind. Joyfully, that is not what happens. The wonder of God is that He hears the cry of a penitent sinner (Luke 18:13,14). Therefore, a man who prays must be humbly honest about himself (I John 1:8,9).

    People must pray to God with an appropriate humbleness based upon a recognition that they are creatures. They are dependent upon the wisdom and power of God to whom they talk. People must pray with an appropriate contriteness based upon a recognition that they are sinful creatures. Before they are saved they deserve condemnation. After they are saved they continue to struggle with the sinful desires of their bodies. They are limited both in body and mind. They are physically and spiritually weak. They are dependent upon the mercy and grace of God to whom they pray (Isaiah 57:15). Therefore, humbleness is a necessary companion to prayer.

    Believers know that God is their Heavenly Father, that they are His dear children. Therefore, they go to Him expecting a loving, sympathetic and helpful response. But they must never forget from where they came and who they are in themselves outside of their Savior Jesus Christ. Believers must never forget that the Bible pictures them before they were saved as beggars who sit along side of a road in the dust with an empty cup (Luke 16:20, 18:35-42). The spiritual situation of unsaved sinners is no different than that of a beggar who must cry out for help and who has no right to be heard or receive anything from Him to whom he cries. Believers must never have the presumption that before they were saved, their prayers obligated God to hear and bless them. Believers must keep in mind the principle that if God wills, He can answer a sinner's prayer, but only if He wills. The only obligation God has is one in which He obligates Himself. If He condescends to answer someone who calls upon Him, it is because He has decided to do that according to His own counsel. Believers must rememeber that they were once unsaved sinners who, as beggars with empty hands, cried out to God for whatever mercy He cared to extend. This is a heritage that should remind all believers, as they go to God in prayer, of their inadequacy to fill their needs and their great abiding dependancy upon God's sustaining grace. This is also a hertiage that should remind all believers who pray that, in themselves, they are unworthy of God's attention and are heard only for the sake of their Savior Jesus Christ.

    Nevertheless, a person's honest awareness of his inadequacy must not demotivate him from coming to God in prayer. People who stay away from God, because they say they feel unworthy, are demonstrating rebellion based upon enormous pride. Such people

wish that they were more worthy than they have shown themselves to be and are embarrassed and chagrined that they do not measure up to a standard they have set for themselves. Rather than come to God with broken and humble hearts, they lament that they have not attained in their own power the level of holiness to which they aspire. On the other ahnd, a person who is truly humble will submit to God's call to come in the name of Jesus Christ. He will recognize that he is not worthy in himself but that Jesus is, and that Jesus has cleared the way to the heavenly Father by His own sacrifice (Heb. 4:15,16). A believer rejoices in the amazing facts that God wills to hear his prayers and that He delights to bestow the riches of the gospel upon all who come to Him with a broken heart (John 6:37).

    We ought to mention that although the Bible describes prayer as a sacrifice (Psalm 141:1,2, Hebrews 13:15), that does not mean people can congratulate themselves after they pray, as if they accomplished a great deed. Nor should they feel sorry for themselves, as if they practiced great self-denial, expending time and energy which they could have spent in their own pursuits. There is no room for pride or self-pity in prayer (James 4:6, I Peter 5:6,7). In fact, those are sinful attitudes that will break the conversation between a man and God (Psalm 66:18). The proper understanding of the idea of sacrifice is that prayer is part of the reasonable service all believers are expected to give to God (Rom. 12:1,2).

Faith

    Luke 18:1-8 is an interesting and helpful passage as we think about prayer. We will not analyze this parable but the conclusion, phrased in the form of a question, helps us understand God's command to pray. Jesus began to teach about prayer with a parable and ended with a question on faith. The conclusion is that faith is the basis for prayer. The reason is that there is no sense in praying to someone for help if we do not expect them to help. After all,why pray if we think they do not care or because we do not believe that they can do anything, even if they wanted to? We must be like the woman in Jesus' parable. That is, we must trust God to be our defender. We must trust Him to be willing and able to help us in time of need.

    The principle that faith is the foundation of prayer is illustrated in the letter to the Thessalonians. The believers in the Thessalonian church were people who had "received the word in much affliction" (I Thess. 1:6). We also read in I Thessalonians 5:17 that the Thessalonians were command to "Pray without ceasing." The idea of

this verse is that the Thessalonians were expected to persist in seeking God as they endured affliction. However, they prayed amid affliction not because it was a good psychological ploy which helped them cope with the hurts inflicted by wicked men, but because they believed God wanted to and actually was able to help them in their distress, no matter what the situation might look like for a time. They believed in what is true about what God had done for them in the past, was doing in the present and would do on that glorious day when He returns to gather them to Himself. Therefore, they fled to God and poured out their concerns to Him who worked in them and controlled the events in the world to do His good will.

    At this point we should add a few words about patience, which is a companion to an attitude of trust. God answers His people in His great way. God also answers His people in His wise time. A person who prays could ask, "When will the person for whom I have prayed so long become saved? How long will I have to struggle with this problem?" God does not reveal His timing as He works out the perfect answer to His peoples' prayers. So they must pray and wait, believing that God has heard them as He has promised and will work things out for the best. Waiting does not mean that they are idle. They must continue to pray and serve God as He reveals His will in the Bible (John 15:7,8). However, they do not continue to pray or serve God as if they have to get His attention or impress Him so that He will be moved to act on their behalf. Rather, they pray because they speak to God whom they love and trust, expecting that all things will work out for good (Rom. 8:28).

    Prayer begins with a heart that believes the Bible, which states that Jesus has cleared the way to the Father and that in Jesus' name sinners can go boldly to the throne of grace (Rom. 5:10, John 14:13,14; 15:16). Prayer continues with a heart that is confident in the Bible, which states that saved sinners are welcomed by God into His presence and that He does all things well for their benefit, in His great way and time (Heb. 4:16, 11:6).

An important note about the origin of prayer

    Our focus upon love, humbleness and trust leads us to think about the origin of prayer. Galatians 5:22-23 states that love, humbleness and faith are fruits of the Holy Spirit. They are three fruits, which among others, are given to us when we are saved. They are heart attitudes which result from God's work of salvation and are found in those people who are in Jesus. That is, prayer is expected of only someone who is saved because prayer accompanies salvation.

    We must keep in mind that prayer is not our idea nor is it even our own natural desire. Instead, prayer is a creation of God (Isaiah 57:19). That is, God must create within us the heart desire, the will and the words to pray. Without God's work, we would have no inclination to pray nor any wisdom to do it as we should.

    It is true that the call to prayer, found many times in the Bible, is a command of God. But the command to pray can be heard and obeyed only by those who have ears to hear and a heart to obey God's word. A life of prayer reveals the work which God has done within a person's heart, much like all the other acts of obedience true believers perform (Heb. 10:22).

    Having said that, we can go back one step further and say that prayer is also part of the process by which God applies the blessing of Jesus' atonement to the lives of His people. Not only do people pray because they are saved, but also God inclined their hearts to pray for salvation in the first place. Unsaved sinners are spiritually dead people and have no ability or desire to cry out to God for mercy. And yet some do. The reason is that as God draws a stubborn and rebellious sinner to Himself, He inclines him to call out to God for mercy. We cannot dissect the process of salvation and examine all of its parts. Nothng we can observe, including prayer, will tell us the instant a person has become saved (John 3:8). How and when God gives a person new life is a spiritual work which He alone understands. However, we can say that the desire to talk to God comes from God's sovereign grace and is part of the means by which He brings people into His kingdom.

    The fact that prayer is a gift of God, helps us in one important way. If we struggle with a neglect of prayer, if we struggle with a lack of desire to pray, the answer is "pray." What we mean by that strange counsel is since only God can give us the gift of prayer and since only God can incline our hearts to want to talk to Him, we must ask Him for that ability and desire. If we do not know even how to begin to pray, then we must cry out to God for the grace to pray, for the origin of prayer is in His hand.

    Now let us briefly consider the prayers of unbelievers. Does God hear and answer unsaved peoples' cry for help, as misguided and poorly motivated as their prayers may be? From one point of view the answer to that question is "yes." If He did not hear and answer any unbelievers, then no one could be saved because all Christians were unbelievers before they were saved. After God creates a desire in the hearts of unsaved people to call upon Him for mercy and after they begin to trust

in Jesus as their Savior and Lord, then they begin to pray to Him according to His will. From another point of view the answer to that question is, "no." God is not obligated to hear and answer the prayers of wicked, stubborn, selfish unbelievers and most times He does not. According to Psalm 66:18, Proverbs 28:9, Isaiah 1:15, Jeremiah 14:12, James 4:3, to name just a few verses, God will not hear and answer the prayers of people who trust in their own abilities and performance and who desire to live in defiance of God's will. That includes people who are part of a church and pray according to all the proper forms, but do not really come to God with a broken and contrite heart.

    And yet there is grace. There must be grace if anyone is to be heard. What a wonder that, in the midst of all people's hateful rebellion against God, He arrests some and turns their minds and hearts so that they begin lives of humble conversation with Him (Acts 9:3-9).

the throne, hears their prayers and does all things well, in His great time and way (Matt. 6:24-34). One great value of prayer is the peace and comfort that comes to people who abanden their own wisdom and strength and pray that God would take complete control of their their minds and hearts as they struggle with trials and personal sins.

    Prayer also has real value in helping true believers grow in grace. Many things that God does within His people, to strengthen their characters and help them conform to His word, are done in His own secret way, unknown to anyone but Him. Nevertheless. we do know that, over time, through the specific and concrete actions of Bible study and prayer, God's people begin to show the fruits of His wise and wonderful work within them. God uses His peoples' prayers to mold their lives to conform to and display His will. That change is another value of prayer.

    However, we must not think that God is compelled to bring revival in response to a campaign in which many people pray earnestly for a mighty work of God. It is true that God's children ought to pray because God does respond to and answer the prayers which express the desires of their hearts, as we read in Psalm 37:4. However, the full understanding of that verse is that God gives His children the heart to desire His will and then He fulfills that desire. That is, God always answers prayers in agreement with His own will. Fervent zeal, even for an apparently good purpose, is not a substitute for a knowledge of God's will. Therefore, rather than insist that, because they have a holy desire, they can expect God to work as they request in their prayers, people who pray must always be concerned about God's will. "Thy will be done" is more than a pious appendage to prayer. It is an accurate and honest recognition that God knows best, and some of the things He may do will surprise His people. As always, God's will is done and that is the real desire of God's people.