A few days ago I stumbled upon (either through the divine providence of God or YouTube's algorithms) on this short video about prayer. Generally, I am skeptical of any video that says it will provide a short guide to anything, as I have learned that short cuts or short and simple solutions to anything are rare in life and I usually run in the opposite direction to anyone making these claims.
Nevertheless, in this case, this video does deliver. But as a caveat, this video is not complete and nothing will substitute for one's own learning and study of the scriptures. Still, this video provides a clear and reasoned basis for how we should pray and conveys principles of prayer that took me years -- and much reading -- to discover, and this video still gave me new insights for improving my prayer.
Prayer, like any other spiritual disciplines, is a skill. Those of us who are not kids (anyone reading my blog) would acknowledge that we have not kept the same conversation style as when we were kids. As our vocabulary and understanding as improved, so did our communication.
Unfortunately, most of us don't evolve our prayer and stick with the same rote prayer that we learned as a child. And a lot of us turn prayer into a time to treat God like vending machine. Doing this things will cause our prayer life to become stale like a dried old bagel left in the our gym bag -- and no one likes that, not even God.
To give you a sense of the video's main point. God does not want a half-hearted prayer done as a last minute activity before we go to bed. He asks for our heart. He desires to connect with us.
As a father, this points hits home. I love to give my daughter things she deserves -- often as reward to her accomplishments. But when my daughter comes to me only because what I can give her and not to be with me, I get sad.
I imagine God feels the same way. While he is eager to bless us and wants us to be happy, he is also a God of supreme love. God not only wants to bless us, but he wants to know us. To be with us. To have us in his presence.
This, is in my mind, the true purpose and the end of prayer: heart-to-heart communication, child to father.
If you have the time, I recommend watching the video instead of just listening to it, and set some time aside to give you space to fully digest the principles being taught. Applying the principles discussed in this video will lead to a richer and more meaningful prayer life -- and one that delivers on the real benefits of prayer.
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