What do you pray for?

Our youngest daughter Klaire’s pick up truck got stolen recently. So we went down to Houston to help her buy a new car. It was the first time I had ever stayed in her studio apartment overnight and it was an adventure.

The apartment is only 480 square feet so me, the Blonde, the 23 year old and her crazy cat all shared one bathroom. We had a great time, God blessed like He always does and Klaire is a great nester. I love her place and even got a chance to hang out by the pool for an hour and rope the Yeti Slick Horns. It was fun to see how the grown up Klaire lives every day. It also reminded this empty nester dad of the good old days when the baby girl was still at home. Excuse me while I wipe away a tear.

You don’t really know someone until you have stayed in their home, and you don’t really know someone until you’ve heard them pray. We hear Jesus pray in John 17. We call it the High Priestly prayer and one of things Jesus does is He prays for you and He prays for me. I like that.

When you hear people pray out loud you can tell a lot about them. How they view God emerges in their conversation with God. Is He a friend or a foe? Someone to trust or is there skepticism? Will He or won’t He? Do we actually know Him or just know of Him? Prayer is not that complicated, it’s not a speech we write down and then read back. Prayer is a dialogue not a monologue. God still speaks today and when we pray we should hear Him but not necessarily audibly.

Prayer is not information. God does not need information and we do not need to inform those we are praying with about the situation. We are talking to Abba Father not giving the back story to others in the room.

Does any of this matter? Yes, because we want to get it right. The disciples were so impressed by Jesus’ prayer life they asked Him to teach them to pray - Luke 11:1. There are right ways and not so right ways to pray, and I’m not sure from a Biblical perspective everything many call prayer qualifies as prayer.

I have a pastor friend who is originally from my hometown and now lives in the big city. We call each other almost every Sunday and Monday. When we talk I stop what I am doing. Sometimes if I am around others I move to a place where I can concentrate. We can’t always do this with God and we should pray without ceasing (1st Thessalonians 5:17) which means we will have casual, sentence prayers throughout the day, but shouldn’t there be times of dedicated conversation as well? Do you have dedicated places that you go to and pray?

Most people want you to pray for people who are sick. That’s not a bad thing because God is the Great Physician. I guess these people see God as a cosmic doctor who fixes people’s bodies and He does. But why don’t we pray more often for those who are sick spiritually? Not everyone is a Christian, right?

Tell me about your prayer habits. What do you pray for and about?

He asked me to ask you that.