By now, I hope you feel like you know the basics of prayer, but in case you don’t sis, I don’t want you to miss out! For my most basic advice, refer to the post titled Christianity 101. There I lay out the ACTS model Once you get comfortable and used to that, you might start to wonder about other ways to pray.
I advise you to decide on how much time you want to set aside for prayer beyond what you do daily. An hour is a good amount of time. (A whole hour? I don’t think I have that much to say!) Oh, but you do…
We’re going to call this your devotional time. I like to set it aside for evenings or weekends; some quiet time for after I’ve got things done. I start by finding a comfortable place to sit and slowing down my breathing. I play worship musicto set the tone(I might start with praise if my energy is high and or I feel like I need to shake some stuff off first). And then I grab some paper (or a journal if I want to keep it all together) and some markers (any writing utensil will do).
While listening to the music, I start to create an outline for my prayers. This can be as basic or as complex as you’d like. I want to spend 10 to 15 minutes worshipping God. I write out things about His character (displayed in the Bible) that are admirable to me. (Girl, if I am losing you, bear with me… you are free to use Google to help you with any part of this process. You can actually type into the search engine “characteristics of God” and stuff will come up.) I might even write out some scriptures that have made an impact on me about God’s goodness, or grace or mercy. It’s completely up to you.
Next, I want to spend some time thanking Him for what He’s done. Most likely, you cover this inyour daily prayer, butthis time, I want to retell to Him and remind Him of times when He has provided for me, or got me out of a bad situation. When you are personally reflecting with God on what He has done and what He has brought you through, you will start to cultivate an authentic gratitude and affection that will open your heart for intimacy with God.
The next thing I want to do is move into a more intimate time. Were I to compare it to a date, after dinner and dessert comes the time to sit with each other and look into each other’s eyes. With God, He sees your heart. It’s a time for me to be still, and try to feel Him searching my heart. In my mind, I might envision being a child, sitting with the Father, on His lap or beside Him. I might see myself hugging His neck and whispering in His ear. I concentrate on expressions of love. (If this is too hard, you can say it out loud: “God I see myself sitting at your feet.” “Lord, I want to be held inyour lap.” “Father, I want to walk with You.” You might not feel it, but you are showing your willingness to enter into that kind of intimacy.)
I want to take a time out to let you know that for a long time, I could not see God as anything other than an extreme, external entity that judged me. My upbringing put Him on a throne, and I felt if anything during prayer, that I was being march into the throne room and plopped down before the King, who I was afraid of. And with my mother poking me from behind, commanded to “Love Him!” When I think of what I know now about how God feels about me, He must have been so upset and sad that my concept of Him was warped. So whenever I would hear my friends call God “Daddy” or “Big Poppa G”, I would roll my eyes and think, how disrespectful. The truth is, I have a wonderful father and I never needed to see God in this way. I prefer (still) to think of Him as King on a horse riding into Battle.
When I started to read about how to get closer to God and this whole love Him like your father thing came up, I was disgruntled and unable to participate. But my desire to know Him and to be closer to Him eventually made me wish I could see Him that way. So when I was alone, I would say out loud, “ I’m sitting in your lap Dad!” even though I didn’t feel like I was. With time, those tender confessions became real in the sense that I could envision it and feel His love radiate back to me.
Now I come to the part of prayer that is the most coveted and requires the most faith. I believe that prayer is a dialogue. I believe that God speaks, straight to our hearts and not to our minds. I believe that the voice of God resides in that place between the middle of your chest and end of your esophagus. The challenge is to turn off our minds and try to tune in, and to wait patiently before Him. Nothing may happen at first! Don’t give up. The result is worth the struggle. In a future post I will talk more about how God speaks. Whatever it is, be it words, an impression, a scripture reference, a memory… make sure it comes from that place in your chest. I know that sounds foolish, but the same way we associate intuition with our stomachs, you have to just trust me on this one.
I finish my time in prayer with thanksgiving to Him, for spending that time with me, and for revealing Himself to me. I turn back on that music and remind myself of who I am in Christ (you can Google that too!). Youmight want to read from the Bible at this point; you certainly are focused and in tune. Follow your heart.
Try this framework out and let me know below how it’s working for you, or what you do differently!