Someone once said that prayer is like breathing.
To live, we have to breathe. In the same way, prayer is essential to our existence as humans. To properly live, we have to pray. It’s our lifeline connection to God.
Yet if only it was so easy as breathing! If we’re in good health, we don’t have to think about breathing—we just do it. But praying is much harder.
If we don’t think about prayer, we probably won’t do it.
And even when we do pray, it’s not necessarily an easy thing. Sure, anyone can say that they’re “praying.” Lots of people say they pray today. But we need to know what prayer really is.
We can first say what true prayer is not.
It’s not chatting to God in heaven, like you chat with your friend or your neighbour, breezily sharing your day.
Nor is prayer verbalizing the various wishes that you cherish, or taking a nightly inventory of your life.
Praying rightly means that we need to first consider what God in heaven wants from us. This is why the disciples of Jesus asked him, “Lord, teach us to pray” (Luke 11:1).
And that’s what Jesus did. He taught his disciples to pray: to truly pray, to pray in such a way that they’d be communing with the living God himself.
The prayer that Jesus teaches is called the Lord’s Prayer. It’s a prayer that shows how God must be put first in our lives, but it’s also a prayer that shows how deeply God is concerned about our daily cares.
It’s a simple prayer—as simple as a breath of fresh air.
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Scripture: Luke 11:1-13
Prayer: Lord God, please teach me to pray in a way that will honour you as the living God, and that will bring blessing to me as your child. Amen.