Week One // What is Prayer?
God wants to commune with us. When creating mankind, He intended to design beings that reflected His very likeness (Genesis 1:27). The fact that we have a natural inclination to communicate with others is a sign that God not only designed and practices communication but deeply loves it Himself. Even in the earliest verses of scripture, we see God speaking freely with and walking alongside His creation in the cool of the day (Genesis 3:8). However, as sin entered the world, the face-to-face communication between man and God came to a pause. But God would not settle for the absence of communion with His beloved. Although it may look different than it did in the Garden, now, one vessel for communication with God is prayer.
Because God created us to be in communion with Him, our souls naturally desire to recognize, communicate, and worship our Creator. In fact, scripture tells us that God has placed eternity in our hearts (Ecclesiastes 3:9). We know this to be true as we glance through the pages of history. For generations, mankind has made countless attempts to connect with a higher being. Through rituals, traditions, story-telling, meditation, and other religious practices, we have attempted to solve the internal mystery of how to connect with our sense that there is more to life than what meets the eye.
As followers of Jesus, we have knowledge and access to the gift of pure, direct, unhindered communication with the one our souls long to know. Prayer is just that: a gift from the Lord that allows us to communicate our burdens, desires, pains, joys, and thanksgiving to Him. It is a response to God’s desire for a relationship with us and is a vehicle of communication with our Father.
As we break down this idea, we should first understand that prayer is communicative. It is a two-sided conversation. As the creator of communication, we trust that God will engage with us as we pray. Often, the Lord approaches us in the stillness of our prayers, especially as we meditate on His Word. Though we often spend much time in prayer speaking, we must also leave room for the Lord to speak. Remember that God encouraged Elijah in stillness (1 Kings 19:11-13).
Perhaps you’ve felt tempted to believe that He does not actually hear our prayers when raised to God. In reality, God promises to listen to us and even longs to hear our prayers (Jeremiah 29:12, Acts 17:27.) First, Peter 5:7 says that we can cast our anxieties upon the Lord because He cares for us. God wants to know our deepest troubles and carry our heaviest burdens. Prayer is a vehicle that allows us to lay those anxieties and burdens upon Him.
Most of all, we must recognize that prayer is a response to a relationship that God has initiated with mankind. To pray is to respond to the reality that there is a real, tangible God who is more powerful than we could ever fully understand. Reliant prayer requires humility to acknowledge that we need a perfect, Holy God.
Along these lines, it is only when we consider ourselves less and consider the Lord more that we will understand the true wonder of prayer. Prayer indicates a longing for the restored communion between God and mankind as it once was before sin. Through Jesus, we have the assurance of the coming restoration when Christ returns in glory. Until then, prayer sustains, enriches, and points us to the God of our salvation.
Jesus invites us to pray with Him. He died on our behalf so that we could be in perfect, holy communion with Him once again one day in heaven. As we recognize His sacrifice, may we prayerfully enter His heavenly gates with humble confidence, recognizing our great need and leaning into the longing for our Lord. As you meditate on God’s word this week, remember that prayer was designed as a gift for us. We have access to the King of the universe, and He promises to hear us when we call for Him. This week, let us devote ourselves to the gift of prayer as an opportunity to know and be known by our Creator (Acts 2:42). Unashamedly, carry your burdens before Him, trusting that He hears and cares for us.
