People are starved for prayer. Even on this tiny blog, one post entitled “Prayer Requests” got quite a few comments, and a good deal of search engine traffic. I had to smile when I read this post titled “Adopt A Nun” at Reformed Chicks, which included this quote from a news article:
But Rosesanne James is convinced that her nuns do more than keep her in the fold
“It’s a direct line to God and it’s cheaper than any phone call.”
It’s funny that Ms. James would use that analogy. There seems to be this persistent idea – even among some Christians – that prayer is some difficult, esoteric ritual that only a select few can perform. The activity of prayer is no mystery. The only mystery in it is that a sovereign God would hear any of us, ever, and care enough to respond. In fact, prayer is a lot simpler than using Skype.
The book Disciplines for Life by C.J. Mahaney and John Loftus, has an excellent chapter on Prayer that includes the “why” and the “how.” Actually the whole book is excellent, and the whole book has been made available for free online. I keep trying to excerpt the prayer chapter for this post, but I can’t – it’s all too good to break up. So here’s a link to the chapter: PRAYER: DIRECT DIAL TO HEAVEN.
Asking other people to pray for your needs is important – that act of sharing the request, and accepting responsibility to help (by praying for) another person with a problem builds faith between two people and is critical to the Christian life. But how much more important is it to build that kind of faith between ourselves and God? He can be trusted far more than I or any other person can with a prayer request. I may genuinely want to help, but I’m no substitute for an omnipotent, omnipresent God. And I’m also no substitute for believers in your church (if you don’t have one, get one!) who will pray with you, and form the kind of relationships that will help them keep you lifted up in prayer.
Prayer is important, and while the prayers of a stranger are worthwhile, the prayers of your church family are better, and your direct line to God is better still. Use them all.
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