This post is going to be a bit different, since prayer is a conversation;
I am pushing to write this as though we are sitting down and talking together.
If I’m being perfectly honest prayer is something that I
have been struggling to get a grasp on for a while. When I first got saved it
was because God answered my prayer. I knew it was God because there was no
other explanation for what happened. Since that time I have learned to lean
more and more on talking to God as an outlet for my frustration and as a way to
get to know him better. However, I have heard a lot of different teachings on
prayer that I still don’t understand and I’m not even sure if they are biblical.
For example in Matthew 18:18-20 Jesus is talking about binding and loosing
things in heaven and on earth. When I look at the context of the passage I can
presume he is talking to the disciples, which makes me question if I actually have the authority to do
what the disciples did since he wasn’t talking to me but to them. Sometimes our
prayers are more cultural colloquialisms than real genuine prayers. Such as
speaking things into existence and commanding angels. Yes life and death is in
the power of the tongue (Proverbs 18:21) but if you are “speaking things into
existence” that go against the will of God they are NOT going to happen. There
also isn’t any scriptural reference for humans commanding angels, God commands
angels to help us if we ask him, and we do not have any authority over angels. So I take these truths into consideration when
I pray because the way I look at it, God is the only one who can do those
things. And I get so sad when I see posts on Facebook where people are binding
spirits, speaking prosperity over their lives, and rebuking Satan because I’m
not sure if they actually have the power to do that and are therefore wasting
their time.
What I do know for a fact is that God definitely has the
power to do all of these things and more and for me right now I go the route of
asking him to do them. For example I am more likely to pray something like: “Lord
if it be your will take this headache away and bring healing to my body” than “I
bind this spirit of infirmity”. The second prayer places me as the source of my
healing and that is unbiblical. So as I continue to grow in Christ and get a
full understanding of what I do and don’t have the power to do, I lean on the
Holy Spirit and the Bible for wisdom on how to pray appropriately. I look at
the psalms and I see the way David prayed. I read about how Moses and Ezekiel
conversed with God and then I go back to the outline Jesus gave for prayer. After
I put all of that together I can humbly come before God and have a casual,
honest conversation.
One of the biggest things I have learned about prayer this
year is that sprinkling the phrase in Jesus name at the end of a rant doesn’t
make the prayer genuine or increase its chances of going past the ceiling. I
know this because I did this, for YEARS, and I kept wondering why God wasn’t listening
to me. Once I realized that prayer is more than just me ranting and raving to
God about all of my issues, I began to see changes in my heart, my perspective,
and my life. I hope that through some intense study and genuine prayer of your
own you will begin to see major changes in your prayer life as well.
