Hi Pastor John.
The Lord put it on my heart early this morning to ask Him to teach me to pray more appropriately; i.e., to pray in His will, and in the manner by which my prayer will be honored—and answered—by Him. (Oftentimes I’ve found myself merely praying for things that I want, rather than giving my desires over to God for Him to provide, as He sees fit. But God is not our servant; not our “butler” to obey our every whim, whatever we might ask for.)
I know that Jesus explained this “manner” of prayer to his disciples, in the garden of Gethsemane, but it would be in vain to repeat that particular prayer in our present time, wouldn’t it? (…as Christians do)
But Jesus’ instructions were to pray like that…
What do you think He meant, exactly?
Could you elaborate on those details in that prayer, and if we ought to use that template for our prayers today?
Brad
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Hi Brad.
I appreciate your sincerity in asking this of the Lord. Include me in your prayer, please.
Yes, it is a vain exercise to repeat, as a ceremonial form, the words Jesus told his disciples to pray. That prayer was only for Jesus’ followers to pray before they were born again on Pentecost morning. It would, as you know, be foolish of me to suggest a specific prayer with specific words for anyone to pray. In this covenant, effective prayer is prayer inspired by the Spirit. In fact, we being as ignorant as we are of things to come and as ignorant as we are of the many wicked spirits around us, Jesus gave us the great blessing of the Spirit to help us pray “as we ought”. to use Paul’s phrase.
Other than point you to the Spirit, to wait to pray until the Spirit leads you to pray, and to say in prayer only what you are moved by the Spirit to say, it could be pointed out that in the disciples’ prayer (what Christians call “the Lord’s Prayer”), there is great reverence and humility before the Father, and great hope in His love. But then, even all that, when it is real and not a ceremonial form, is from the Spirit; so, we’re back to the Spirit inspiring the prayer.
There’s just no way around it. Be led by the Spirit, or your prayer is in the flesh. What a precious opportunity we have, to be led by the Spirit! If we live after the Spirit, Paul said, we will live forever! But if we live after the flesh, he said, we will die. May God give you and me, and all of us, the grace to follow after the holy Spirit of life, and truly be sons of the living God.
Thanks for writing, Brad. I believe that the Lord will guide you and add to your faith whatever you need to make your prayer ever more effective.
Your servant,
Pastor John