Prayer - what is it and how do you do it? (5 messages)

"If prayer is talking to God, who is this God that we talk to? At the level of our human experience, we can assert the following: how we talk to people, and what we say, will to a large extent be governed by how well we know them, the more intimate our speaking will be... Thus, we can say that how we know God will greatly affect the way we approach him in prayer."

Graeme Goldsworthy, 2003, Prayer and the Knowledge of God, IVP, p. 18.

Whatever we say about prayer, I think we all have to admit it is hard work. It seemed like hard work even when Jesus was doing it. Mostly, however, we simply find it difficult to be interested in it for any more than a few seconds a day. And we feel guilty about that.

Then come the other problems: how do we pray, what do we pray for in difficult situations, why is praying in public so hard and so on.

I don't think God meant for prayer to be hard work. We should enjoy talking to him. He gets pleasure out of it so why do so many Chrisitans not get pleasure out of doing it?

To put it another way, if I organised a two hour musical concert I know exactly how I would promote it and what response I would receive, but how would I go about promoting a two hour prayer meeting?

Join me in our discussion on the how & why of prayer. It wiill still be hard work, but by the grace of God it will be filled with blessing. Amen.

Terry