Prayer is key to abiding in Christ, a God-given way of connecting with the Spirit and encountering Jesus.
Through prayer, we receive grace and strength to love God and grow in love. We are led into greater intimacy with Him as we connect with His heart in deep partnership.
He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. (Jn. 15:5)
The foundation of this mutual abiding relies on conversation with God—prayer is simply talking with Him. But we don’t always know what to say, or we feel that we don’t have the right words to articulate our prayers.
Through the centuries, the Church has prayed the prayers of the Bible. Several books can be found today on praying the Scriptures, and yet believers still often overlook the efficacy of praying the Word. We like to call it “pray-reading” the Word, in which we take time to speak the truths of Scripture back to God as we read.
True fellowship includes a two-way dialogue. The Spirit honors our part in the relationship by not forcing us to dialogue with Him. Instead He beckons us to a deeper and more continual conversation.
The same God who calls us to abide has provided a way for us to do that through His Son and His Word. This invitation comes with overwhelming assistance.
The most substantial way in which we can bolster our prayer lives is by feeding on the Word of God. Through the Word, we can actively dialogue with God by praying promises that we are to believe and Scriptures that we are to obey.
For example, the Bible says that God is our good shepherd: “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want” (Ps. 23:1). So as we read this verse we can pauses to thank God for this truth. Then we can ask Him to teach us more about how is our good shepherd—to reveal to us the certainty of His provision and care and how much He loves us in order to help us believe this truth.
The same can be done regarding our obedience to the Word. In John 14:15, Jesus clearly stated that those who love Him will keep His commands. As we read, we can pray, or verbalize, our commitment and say, “I set my heart to love You and obey You with my speech, time, money, and thoughts.”
Then we can ask God to empower us to obey Him by praying, “Father, help me to love You, to bridle my speech, to use my time and money in full obedience, and to think thoughts that honor You.”
As you “pray-read” through Scripture, record your thoughts and prayers in a journal. This helps us capture the truths that the Spirit gives us and to develop language to talk with God.
With time, the power of the Word will strengthen the inner man—the mind, will, and emotions of the believer. We will experience more of God’s grace renewing our minds and emotions if we ask for it on a regular basis. God releases much more blessing if we ask for it regularly with faith (Jas. 4:2).
We can be encouraged, knowing that even when we do not feel strength in our inner man in an overt way, the Spirit’s power is working to influence our thoughts and emotions as we “pray-read” the Word and dialogue with almighty God.
