How To Pray According to God’s Will
in Resources
A question many people will ask themselves is how can God hear and receive my prayers? Is there a certain way to pray in order for God to know what I’m asking for? The list of questions goes on and on, but it is a valid one to know about, nevertheless.
As fellow believers, these are times in which our faith is put to the test. That is why, it is important that one turns to God and turns to his word to seek guidance and wisdom. This firstly starts with prayer and having the proper heart to ask God for an answer.
Many on the other hand, would want their prayers answered and demand that they’d be shown a sign or a miracle as evidence for their request. Rather than having that kind of heart and attitude, one has to respect and understand God’s point of view. There are certainly other ways to figure out a solution that does not jeopardize one’s relationship with God.
For instance, when it comes to prayer, the purpose of performing this activity is to demonstrate our devotedness in asking for constant guidance and protection. God will either approve or decline if a prayer is offered, depending on what is raised up to Him.
Therefore the kinds of prayers that we ask in front of God must be carefully examined. The easiest way to look at this is whether or not we can answer a phone call from someone we know as opposed to someone we don’t know.
One prayer in particular we can learn from is the Lord’s Prayer found in Matthew 6:9-13, “This, then, is how you should pray: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.’”
Based on the prayer above, we are able to take away the fact that God understands what we need and provides us the means to get through all kinds of situations.
Furthermore, another example we can learn from is Isaiah 55:8-9, which goes into how God’s thoughts and ways are higher than our own. The verse starts as follows, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
From this, what we are able to perceive is the importance of not putting our own needs before God’s who desires us to follow His will.
In other words, there’s a proper way to do prayer, but there have been moments when we have failed to do it according to God’s will. Now that we know the true way of doing prayer, then God is pleased with us.
Therefore, as we learn prayer, we must always turn to God and His word in order to understand God’s will for us. If we take a look at Psalms 141:2, for example, “May my prayer be set before you like incense; may the lifting up of my hands be like the evening sacrifice.”
The comparison of prayer to incense indicates the very process of how prayers are lifted up to God and whether or not he accepts or declines them. By understanding this figurative incense, we are able to truly understand and perceive the importance of how prayers are offered up to God.
As a result, what do we all have in common? We desire for our prayers to be answered and to receive a sign or some sort of miracle to prove that God has listened to us.
It is not that simple, but we must consider God’s point of view since he is not a genie that fulfills our every wish that we summon upon. In short, this gives people the ability to further understand the true intention of prayer in order to draw closer to God while fulfilling his will.