In our series on the ‘A-Z of Christian Faith‘, we have reached the letter P: P is for Prayer. Prayer is our ability to communicate with the Almighty God and can involve personal prayer and corporate prayer. It can involve words (Jesus is described as ‘the Word’, so this is no surprise), but can also be silent; it can involve different postures (kneeling, standing, sitting, prostrate) and different traditions (set prayers, spontaneous prayers and so on.) What matters is not so much how we pray as that we pray.
There are many obstacles to prayer, however, including our tendency to prevaricate:
Everything seems to crowd out prayer, but we need to just get on and pray! (see Ps 5:3, Ps 63:6, Ps 119:164) Other obstacles include sin, which means we tend to flee from God’s presence instead of confessing and repenting (see 1 Jn 1:9), and doubt and discouragement, which usually result from God not answering prayer the way we expect Him to, leading us to become unconvinced of His goodness or power. We have to press on, however (see Heb 12:1-2), and learn to pray in all situations (see 1 Thess 5:17).
The acrostic ACTS reminds us that prayer involves:
- Adoration (focussing our attention on who God is – see Ps 89)
- Confession (allowing God’s Word to search us – see Ps 139:23-24 – so that we can repent and confess immediately and allow God to restore to us the joy of salvation)
- Thanksgiving (realising the power of giving thanks in and for everything and learning to give thanks for who God is and for His many blessings – see Ps 136:1, Eph 1:3, Rom 8:37-39)
- Supplication (learning to seek God earnestly, bringing our petitions and requestions to Him, and learning to intercede for others as well – see Phil 4:4-7, 1 Tim 2:1-4)