by Kevin Burton
It’s lunch time again at our school for the spiritually blind, time to refuel.
We’re in our second set of classes, heading toward graduation. This series comes from the fact that to be spiritually blind is far worse than being physically blind.
In our first semester we refueled at lunchtime with Bible study (“Can’t Grow Unless You Feed Your Spirit,” July 11). Today we’ll be serving up prayer. The two go together of course.
Prayer is a necessary fundamental of Christianity. We get this from no less an authority than Jesus himself.
We see him not just saying a quick prayer, but putting the clamoring world on hold to take time to be alone with God.
“And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed,” (Mark 1: 35 KVJ).
We see it again in Luke 6:12, this time Jesus separating Himself all night praying to God the day he chose the twelve disciples.
“And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.”
Prayer allows you to slow down, take the focus off yourself and your problems and put it on God. You have the ear of the creator of the universe. How can we not take advantage of that?
You save yourself a lot of heartache by going to God first, to learn His will for your life.
The ideas that you come up with independently may not go horribly bad right away. You may even stumble upon some of the same plans God would have put in place for you. But don’t be fooled. God’s timing is always better, His instructions and plans more complete and without error.
Why travel a long way down the wrong road and find yourself having to retrace your steps?
“For followers of Jesus Christ prayer is the best way to communicate with God. Prayer is the vehicle for daily dialogue with the One who created us,” reads a passage on the website www.qotquestions.org.
“It is so important that it is mentioned more than 250 times in Scripture.”
“God calls us to bring our concerns to Him for disposition and potential blessing. He also calls us to share our joys and triumphs with Him,” the website reads.
“In fact, Jeremiah 33:3 states, “Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.”
Prayer allows us to give thanks to God.
“In 1 Chronicles 16:34, we are commanded to ‘give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.’ The psalmist tells us in Psalm 9:1, ‘I will praise you, O LORD, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonders,’” the website reads.
Prayer is also the means of confessing and repenting of sin.
“Scripture makes it very clear: ‘Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the LORD’— and you forgave the guilt of my sin’ (Psalm 32:5).
“Tell God what He already knows. Humbly submit yourself and ask for forgiveness in prayer. Also ask God for the strength to repent of our sins,” the website reads.
Perhaps no other verse better summarizes why we should pray on a daily basis than 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18: ‘Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus,’” the website reads.
Praying is also a means of acknowledging that God is in control.
“God is sovereign. Nothing happens without God knowing about it. Because He is sovereign over all, He deserves our worship and praise,” the website reads.
Class Notes, Lunch, Prayer: What a privilege to spend time with the sovereign God of the universe and bring our concerns to him. Prayer is an essential daily conversation to talk to and hear from God. Those problems don’t look so big when God is in the conversation, do they?
One for the spiritual road: It is truly amazing that God would want to have fellowship with us at all. In fact, the psalmist asks, “What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” (Psalm 8:4).
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