How to Pray

Prayer is as normal to the Christian as breathing is to the human, and the reason you breathe is because of the air pressure that is exerted against your lungs that forces your lungs to take air in. When you're born into the family of God and you enter into God's world, the atmosphere of God's presence and grace exerts pressure on your life, and the normal thing is to breathe, and we just say that's prayer. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur.

I'm your host, Phil Johnson. Martin Luther said, Just as it's the business of tailors to make clothes and cobblers to make shoes, so it's the business of Christians to pray. Certainly there is no more natural response for the believer saved by grace than to praise and worship God in prayer. Still, for most of us, probably, prayer isn't quite as spontaneous as we would like.

Rather, it's a discipline we need to work on. Today on Grace to You, John MacArthur examines the spiritual discipline of prayer as he continues his look at the fundamentals of Christian living. This study is called Spiritual Boot Camp. The title of today's message, simply enough, How to Pray.

So to begin the lesson now, here's John MacArthur. We're going to talk about how to pray right now. One of the very basic things about the Christian life is praying. Reading the Bible is like eating, while praying is like breathing. One of the other things that it's really helpful to do if you happen to be alive is breathe.

It has a very redeeming value. You exist when you come into the world in an atmosphere, and one of the things that the atmosphere does is put pressure on your lungs. And from the very beginning you breathe, and the reason you breathe is because of the air pressure that is exerted against your lungs that forces your lungs to take air in. That's why it's much more difficult to hold your breath than it is to breathe.

You hold your breath for about a minute and you turn purple and your heart starts pounding and you get sweaty because you're resisting the normal pressure against your lungs. Well, prayer is like that. When you're born into the family of God, when you're born again, when you become a child of God and you enter into God's world, there is a sphere in which you live. The atmosphere of God's presence and grace exerts pressure on your life and the normal thing is to breathe, and we just say that's prayer, responding to God's pressure and presence in your life. Prayer is as normal to the Christian as breathing is to the human.

You live in an atmosphere and you respond to that atmosphere of the presence of God by receiving that presence of God and by taking it in and putting it back out again in response to Him. Prayer really is important. We talk a lot about prayer and we throw the word around, but prayer is a tremendous power. Somebody once said, prayer is the slender nerve that moves the muscles of omnipotence. And prayer activates the power of God.

That's putting the same thing in a simple term. Prayer activates the power of God. God moves in response to the prayers of His people. And not only that, but prayer lines you up properly with God. When we're told to pray, we are told to pray in the Spirit. Now what it means to pray in the Spirit is to pray consistently with the Spirit of God. Prayer is to align us with the will and purpose of God.

When we pray in the will of God or in accord with God's will, we are lining up with His purposes. And so prayer has a definite effect of lining us up with God's purposes. Prayer really does change things. I know when I was a little kid we had a deal in our dining room and said, prayer changes things.

It really does. Prayer is effective. There was a guy doing some sculpture one time and he was down and pounding on the bottom of this thing on the ground. And a preacher came in and said, I wish I could deal such changing blows on the hearts of men.

And the sculptor looked at him and said, maybe you could if you worked like me on your knees. And there's a lot of truth to that. If my experience has taught me anything, and I say this with a very genuine feeling that what I say you probably won't really understand totally. But from my standpoint in the ministry, I know the difference in my ministry when there is prayer and when there is not. It is very evident to me. Both the prayers of people, even people I don't know, and my own faithfulness in prayer makes a very distinguishable difference in my ministry.

And I am very aware of it. Prayer is very effective. We would say that prayer simply is talking to God. It's just conversation.

Like you talk to anybody. It isn't a whole lot of these and thou's and holy mogus and all kinds of fancy words. It's not a vocabulary contest to see who can say the most theological words without taking a breath.

It isn't that at all. And prayer is not vain repetition. It's not please, oh, do this, oh, I beg you, I beg you, I beg you, you know, please do this, please, you know, you don't need to beg like that. The Pharisees had endless repetition. God isn't deaf and He heard you the first time. There isn't any need, there isn't any need for endless repetition.

That's Matthew chapter 6. Prayer is not endless repetition. Prayer is not begging, begging, oh, please, oh, please, oh, please do this, and if you only do this and I'll do this.

It's not that kind of thing, although there is petition and there is earnestness in it. Prayer is simply conversation. But there are some rights and some wrongs and some things about prayer that we need to understand basically. Prayer is simply talking to God. It isn't to be sophisticated. It isn't to be formal or informal.

It's just anything. Paul says in Ephesians 6, 18, praying always with all kinds of prayer, any kind of prayer. You could be crying out, oh God, you know, in a terrible time of stress or you could be saying, Lord, this is a terrific day, I'm really happy and just want you to know I'm checking in. You know, that's prayer. Any kind of communion with God at any point, any level, on any subject. Communion with God is prayer.

You don't have to close your eyes. Of course, I grew up in a church that was rather provincial and whenever you prayed, you know, you sort of did this little routine, you close your eyes and bow your head and all that kind of stuff. And it's important to teach kids to do that so they don't look around a room and make little noises and fool around and sneak, you know, their dinner and stuff. So you get them to go and do this just so nobody starts before you, you see, or else we hold hands, you know, just to get them to concentrate. I used to go out with this bunch of guys and we used to go on the road and we'd go to preach and sing and we had a quartet and a lot of funny deals we did. So we'd go out and every time we'd go out, we'd have a prayer meeting, you know. The first time I went out, we went out and everybody prayed with their eyes open, especially the guy who was driving, you know. It's his turn to pray and he just, I mean, we were glad for that. We were, you know, we didn't want to just have him close his eyes and commit everything to the Lord. He couldn't drive well with his eyes open for it.

But anyway, he'd drive along and, you know, the first time it happened, I thought, I wonder if the Lord hears. I mean, he doesn't have his eyes closed. And then every time you see somebody pray on television, they've always got their eyes wide open. It really doesn't matter, you know, the Bible says you can pray with your eyes lifted up to heaven. It says you can pray with your hands lifted up. It says you can pray kneeling. You can pray bowing. You can lie down and pray. You can stand up. You can pray while you're walking, sitting. You know, it doesn't matter. Praying is just conversing with God. And the particular physical position, the particular mode, what you do with your eyeballs isn't the issue.

That's not the issue at all. The idea is communing with God. Now let me just talk about prayer very briefly. First of all, the necessity for prayer. It is necessary, number one, because it is commanded.

And anything that is commanded of the Christian becomes necessary. Jesus said in Luke 18, 1, I want everybody everywhere to pray and not to faint. You know what most people do when they have a problem? Faint. Jesus said, don't faint.

Do what? Pray. He wants you to pray, not faint.

You know, Peter had a problem. He's always fallen asleep in prayer meetings and Jesus said to him, you know, if you stayed awake and prayed, you wouldn't be in the mess you're in. Watch and pray lest you enter into what? Temptation.

You see, Peter didn't pray so he didn't have himself girded really for the temptation. If you prayed more than you'd sleep, you'd be better off. You know, some of us go to bed at night and we say, dear Lord, and we're gone, you know. We wake up the next day and we bomb out all day.

Well, you know what we did? We went to sleep instead of praying. Watch and pray lest you enter into temptation. Prayer undergirds us. It's necessary to pray.

It's necessary because it's commanded. Incidentally, you can pray to anybody in the Trinity you want. Pray to God. People say, oh, but you have to pray in the name of the Lord Jesus.

Well, we'll talk about what that means. You can pray to God. You can pray to Christ. You can talk to the Holy Spirit. You can just talk to anybody in the Trinity, or you can say, I want all of you to listen here. I have something to say to all of you.

So you can call them all in there. Now it is commanded that we not only pray, but it is commanded that we pray a lot. In fact, it says, praying always in Ephesians 6 18 and in 1 Thessalonians 5 it says, pray without what? Ceasing. Now, you know, I used to wonder, pray without ceasing.

How do you do that? Because as a child, all I could see was your eyes closed and your hand, you could go around the world like this. It would be like the bruised and bleeding Pharisees, you know. They were a group of Pharisees at the time of Jesus who thought it was a sin to look at a woman.

So whenever a woman appeared, they immediately closed their eyes and they kept running into walls and that's how they got their name, see. But we don't want you to be bruised and bleeding Christians going around praying and running into everything. So that isn't the idea of praying always or praying without ceasing. It simply means that you are in an attitude of God consciousness at all times. It is commanded that you see everything in relation to God.

Let me give you an illustration of how that works. You're going through life and you're just minding your own business. You see something good. You see a clear day, you see a lovely little child or you hear a friend call you on the phone and you think about the love of that friend or maybe you look at the person you love and you just say, isn't that great?

So what do you do? What's your first reaction? Thank you, Lord, for that. You're seeing things in relation to God. You don't just say, isn't that a nice thing? You say, God, you made that and you made it that way and I thank you for that.

You see everything in relation to God and you converse with Him about it. You see something bad. You don't say, there's something bad.

That's too bad. Bad things are around. You say, no. God, there's something that's bad. I want you to make it good, Father.

Can you do something about the situation? So you see a bad thing in relation to God. Or maybe you see a problem and you say, Lord, there's a problem, deliver us from the problem, solve the problem, gain glory from the problem.

You see, in other words, everything it is, good, bad and different, whatever it is, you see it in the light of God. It becomes something for which you can talk to God. That's praying without ceasing. It's not just mumbling all through the day some little words or praying some special prayer. It's just relating everything that goes on in your life through the day to the presence of God.

He's there. You can all think of a best friend you have. Maybe it's your husband or wife or boyfriend, girlfriend or whatever. But think of the best friend and imagine your best friend was with you today all day by your side. You had a whole day with your best friend or the person you loved most. That person never left your side this entire day. And you talked to that person today just as many times as you talked to Christ today. How much conversation did you have with him?

Did you pray at all today? How would your friend feel if he spent the whole day with you and you never said a word and he was there the whole time? Well, it would be a little ridiculous, wouldn't it? It would probably be the start of the end of your friendship. You would at least acknowledge that they were there and you would begin to see things in the light of the presence of your friend. You'd say, hey, isn't that terrific? Did you see that?

Isn't that too bad? You know, we ought to do something about that. You're relating everything to the presence of your friend. That's how it is in prayer. All you're doing is relating everything to the presence of God. And that's a God conscious attitude and that's praying without ceasing. All right, so the necessity of prayer is predicated first of all on the fact that it's commanded.

Secondly, it brings glory to God. You know, when you pray, God gets glorified because then He can answer and when He answers, then you praise Him. John 14, 13 says that we're to pray and He will answer for His own glory.

Whatever you will ask in My name, I'll do it that the Father may be glorified. God says I answer prayer to get the glory. So prayer is a way in which God can display His power and gain glory and that's very important. All right, thirdly, we are to pray because prayer blesses us. The way we say the word blessing means it makes you happy. When you pray, you get happy. Praying people are happy people.

You know why? They're talking to God and it's great to talk to God. And then God answers what we ask and that makes us happy. Fourth, prayer is important because it works. I'm like you, I want to do what works, right? I'm not going to waste my time doing something that doesn't have any effect. Prayer works. James 5, 16 says the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man does what?

Avails much. It works. Effectual fervent prayer from a righteous heart works. It actually activates God.

It makes a difference. It works. Sometimes He answers no, but He answers yes enough for us to know that prayer works. First John 5, 15 says, and we know that if we know that He hear us, whatever we ask, we know we have the petitions we desired of Him.

If God hears, John says, then we know He answers. Prayer really works. It really does have an effect.

How does it work? That's a good question. First, under that, sometimes it works immediately. Have you ever noticed that? Sometimes you can't hardly believe how fast it works. Sometimes prayer works immediately. Isaiah 65, 24 says, great statement, and it shall come to pass that before they call, I will answer, and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. God's already sending the answer before we've even gotten the prayer off.

It works immediately sometimes. Secondly, sometimes it's delayed. Sometimes we may pray for something and we have to wait because God knows a lot more than we know, and He knows it's better to come later than to come now.

Luke 18, 7, and shall not God avenge His own elect who cry day and night unto Him though He bear along with them? In other words, sometimes you have to go through a lot of things, and sometimes God's chosen people have had to suffer and suffer and suffer and suffer, and it seems like it goes on and on and on, but God will answer even though it takes Him a long time to get His answer, and that's because He has a purpose. So sometimes it's immediate.

Sometimes it's delayed. Sometimes it's different than we asked for. Sometimes He gives us even more than we asked for.

I'll never forget, it's this guy named Pappy Reveal. He was really a character. His legs were paraplegic, so he couldn't stand up, but he had a wheelchair and he had tremendously strong arms for an 85-year-old man, and he would come and he would preach by holding on the pulpit. He'd hang on the pulpit and his legs would dangle behind the pulpit. He'd just hang on there and lean over there, and he could really pray.

I mean, the guy had the gift of faith, and he could pray, and it was incredible. He was telling a story one time, and he would talk at the top of his voice. He was the head of some big mission in the Midwest, and he was, and I needed a station wagon. He was going on and on about this station wagon, and he says, I got down on my knees, and I said, God, you know I need a station wagon. And he was telling God a blue one, you know, with the thing in his...and he was going through this whole prayer of the station wagon. And so he said, you know what happened within one week?

We got three new station wagons. Hallelujah, you know, and he'd holler real loud, amen, amen, amen. You say amen about five times whenever he got happy. Well, here was a case where God gave him more than he asked for. You know, God knew he needed more than he thought he needed, I guess. That's biblical, Jeremiah 33, 3.

Don't always count on that so that when it comes you're surprised. Jeremiah 33, 3 says, they call on me and I will answer thee and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not, even beyond what you know. Great and mighty things which thou knowest not. It's kind of like Ephesians 3, 20, now in him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all we can ask.

He can do more than we can ask. I can think about my own ministry coming to Grace Church and praying in the early years, Lord, I want you to use me here and I want you to bless this church. And I never even dreamed what would happen.

I had absolutely not the slightest inclination of what was going on. And nobody is more surprised than me at what God has chosen to do, far beyond what I ever could ask or think. All right, the conditions of prayer. Now when you're going to pray, how are you going to pray? A, asking in Christ's name.

And this needs to be explained because more people get this oversimplified. They think that at the end of every prayer you say, in Jesus' name, amen, and that guarantees it. Praying in Christ's name. Oh, and then you get some Presbyterian who prays and says, amen, and you say, oh, he didn't say in Jesus' name, amen, that'll never get beyond the ceiling. I heard a guy say one time, that's like sending a letter to God without a stamp.

I mean you've got to have this little formula zapped on the end, you know, or it doesn't get there. Now that's really ridiculous. You read the prayers in the Scripture, you're going to find very few of them that end in Jesus' name, amen. That is not what it means in John 14, 13 when it says, if you ask anything in my name. What the word name means is all that Jesus is. So praying in His name is asking consistently with who He is, that's all.

It is saying, this I ask as if Christ was asking it. Another way, the idea of name means all that He is. The name of Christ is all that He is. The totality of His person in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.

What did that mean? That the little name had a trick thing to it, a formula? No, it meant that because of who He is, because of His power and His person, walk. So the name means all that He is. So when I ask in Jesus' name, I'm asking consistent with who He is. Illustration. Father, this I ask because I know this is what Jesus would want. You got it? Try that at the next prayer.

Lord, all the stuff I've been asking for, I'm asking because I know that's hard to say. This is what Jesus would want. That's how to pray in His name. Now that will clean up a lot of the junk, right? Right there.

You get rid of a lot of stuff. Like the little kid who said, Lord, bless mommy and bless daddy. And at the top of his voice, he says, and God, I'd like a new bicycle. His dad says, well, God isn't deaf. He says, I know, but grandma's in the next room and she's hard of hearing. Yeah, well, who are you praying to?

A little selfish there. Like James says, you ask a mist to consume it on your own lusts. And that's why you don't get it.

You receive not. So asking in Christ's name is saying, this is what I ask because this is what I believe Jesus would want. Can you pray about the one you love and say, I pray for their salvation because this is what I believe Jesus would want? Sure. Can you pray for your own spiritual welfare because you know this is what Jesus would want?

Sure. There are some things that you know He wants and you know He would pray for. That's what it means to ask in His name.

All right. Secondly, we not only ask in Christ's name, we ask in faith. We ask believing.

God wants you to believe Him. And then when He does respond, you'll give Him praise. Matthew 21, 22, in all things whatever you ask in prayer believing you will receive. The first condition, ask consistent with Christ. The second condition, ask believing. Do you really believe God does answer prayer in your heart?

That's a condition. And what He means by that is, well, God, if you're really up there, do a trick and then I'll believe in you. No, no. God is not doing tricks to make people believe. He is responding to the prayers of those who do. Believing. In fact, it says if you had the faith of a grain of a mustard seed, you could do what? Move a mountain. And I remember the story of the little old lady who said she had a mountain in her backyard. She wanted to get rid of this hump so she could put a garden. And so she got down and she prayed, Oh Lord, I know that you can remove a mountain and I believe in you. She got up in the morning and the mountain is still there.

Ha! She says, I knew it. Well, that's not exactly asking in faith. She knew all along God wouldn't do that. There's another scripture that comes to mind, James 5.15, the prayer of faith shall save the sick and the Lord shall raise him up. And there again, you have implied in the idea of praying, the idea of faith.

Asking believing. Thirdly, asking in God's will. Consistently with God's will. You always have to say, Father, this I ask in your will. First John 5.14, this is the confidence that we have in Him if we ask anything according to His what?

Will, He hears and does it. So in Christ's name, asking in faith and in God's will. If we say, God, do this whether you like it or not, He's not going to do that.

God is not up there whimsically responding to everything we ask for whether He wants to do it or not. Prayer, as I said, is lining us up with God's will. Another thing, prayer must come from a pure heart. Pure heart. James 5.16, the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man. If there's garbage in your life, the channel of prayer is really closed off. And then the last thing is we're to ask with earnestness.

God really wants what is called, by the old English word, importunity. Remember the guy in Luke 11 who wanted to get the bread? So he goes and he starts banging on the door and the guy's asleep and he says, get out of here. And the guy keeps banging and banging and banging and the guy says, get out.

Bang, bang, bang. The guy finally comes down and he says, I want some bread. And the Lord says, you see, he got the bread for his much knocking, so shall you for your much asking. In other words, this is seeking. This is being so intense and so desirous that you continue to seek the Lord. Not endless repetition, but earnestness. All right, thirdly, the content of prayer.

We're moving pretty quick, but we want to wrap it up. The content of prayer. What is prayer to be about? Well, first of all, the kind of prayer.

We mentioned that earlier. Ephesians 6, 18, all kinds. Any old kind. Standing up, sitting down, crying out, whispering, praying in a closet, praying in public, supplication, which is asking for things, interceding, which is praying for somebody else's needs, thanksgiving, which is thanking God for what He's done, praise, which is just extolling His virtues, any kind, all kinds. Now what is to be the subject of your prayers? Who do you pray about?

Two things, yourself and others, that's it. Pray for yourself and pray for others. It'll be an interesting study for you sometime to trace in the Bible who you're told to pray for.

You ever do that? You can find a whole long list of about 15 different specific groups that you're told to pray for. You're supposed to pray to the Lord, He'll send forth laborers into His harvest. You're supposed to pray for new missionaries and teachers and preachers. You ever pray for that?

You're told to pray for that. Do you ever pray for your president? You're told to pray for those in authority over you. Do you ever pray for the governor, the policeman? Do you ever pray for your local police? Ah, I should pray for your local police.

Pray for the governor. There's a lot of people you're supposed to be praying for, and they're all there in many places in New Testament. You're listening to Grace to You with John MacArthur. Along with teaching on the radio, John also serves as chancellor of the Master's University and Seminary in Southern California. His lesson today showed you how to cultivate the spiritual discipline of prayer.

It's part of John's series titled Spiritual Boot Camp. Well, John, I have a very practical question for you about prayer. What do you think is the greatest source of discouragement when it comes to praying the way we know we should? Well, I think there are two things that are always a challenge in prayer. Number one is to know precisely what to pray for.

And I think we know that if we pray according to the will of God, he hears and answers our prayers. So being sure we're praying according to his will is the first challenge. And the second thing is being patient to continue to pray when we don't necessarily see a response immediately. It can be discouraging to be praying and not be sure exactly what you should pray for in a certain setting.

And it can be discouraging to be waiting and waiting and not seeing an answer. And that's where the work part of prayer comes in, because we want to be faithful. Pray without ceasing, even when you're not sure exactly what the will of God is.

And even when you don't see something happen immediately, continue to pray. If nothing else, of course, prayer is sweet fellowship and communion with the Lord. Prayer has so many benefits, and obviously we're talking about those in our series on Spiritual Boot Camp. But let me mention to you a book called Alone with God. That is a book that helps you rediscover the power and passion of prayer. Title of the book, Alone with God, prayer is work, but it's worth the effort because you get to live in the joy of answered prayer directly from heaven. Alone with God, it'll help you increase your prayer fervency and effectiveness. It includes a detailed study on the master prayer that Jesus taught his disciples, and there are so many rich lessons in that prayer. Others like seeking the Lord in secret, a heart set on God, praying for the right things, and praying for the lost. If you've never been in touch with us before, that is with grace to you, make contact today and request the book titled Alone with God. Here's the good news, we'll send it to you with our compliments, free to anyone contacting us for the first time. It's a couple hundred pages long, and it'll make a difference in your prayer life for sure.

Yes, that is for sure. Grace is a great resource for developing a deeper communion with the Lord. And friend, remember, Alone with God, the book is our gift to you if you have never contacted us before. Request your free copy of the book today. You can call our toll-free number, 800-55-GRACE, or go to our website, gty.org. Alone with God is an ideal book to give to a friend or a new believer who needs encouragement on how to pray. And again, we'll send you a copy for free if it's your first time contacting us.

Just request your copy at our website, gty.org, or call our customer service team at 800-55-GRACE. And while you're on the website, gty.org, make sure you download the Study Bible app if you haven't got it already. It gives you the text of Scripture and quick access to thousands of resources that will help you understand what you're reading, including sermons, blog articles, questions and answers. And for a reasonable price, you can add the notes from the MacArthur Study Bible. That gives you 25,000 detailed explanations that can help you see Scripture's life-changing truth like you've never seen it before. To download the Study Bible app, visit gty.org. Now for John MacArthur, I'm Phil Johnson. Remember to watch Grace To You television this Sunday, check your local listings for channel and times, and then be back here tomorrow for another half hour of unleashing God's truth one verse at a time, here on Grace To You.