Friday Night Message: Prayer - Part XVII

Good evening brethren,
During the past few months we have addressed various questions regarding prayer:

WHAT IS PRAYER?
WHO SHOULD PRAY?
WHY SHOULD WE PRAY?
HOW SHOULD WE PRAY?

Tonight we are finishing the question WHAT SHOULD WE PRAY ABOUT?

WHAT SHOULD WE PRAY ABOUT?

1. Praise
2. Thanksgiving
3. God’s Will
4. Others

Your needs

· Physical
· Spiritual
· Forgiveness of sin
· Strength in trials
· Character development/spiritual growth

Bible Study

The Bible itself is an excellent source of food for thought – there should be a wealth of ideas for you to
pray about as a result of your frequent study of God’s word. A person can strengthen their prayer life
by strengthening their Bible study. Studying God’s word will prompt questions that you may want to
ask God about, and focus your attention upon areas of your life that perhaps need adjustments or
corrections.

Ask God

   Finally, you should ask God for help in knowing what to pray about. The gospel of Luke demonstrates
the desire of Jesus’ disciples to learn how to pray. Their question prompted Jesus to answer them…
Luke 11:1 – Now it came to pass as Jesus was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, that one of
His disciples said to Him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples
And here is a verse from Paul’s epistle to the church of God at Rome…
Rom. 8:26 – Likewise the spirit also helps us in our weaknesses. For we do no know what we should
pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be
uttered.

   We have had about ½ dozen Friday Night Messages answering the question … WHAT SHOULD WE
PRAY ABOUT! That’s quite a lot to pray about. We shouldn’t have problems coming up with things
to pray about. Instead, we should have problems fitting enough prayer time into each 24-hour day to
reasonably utilize suggestions in answering this question.
In fact, that’s so much to pray about, you might be thinking to yourself …. how can I possibly
remember it all? Well …. You don’t have to – if you write it down. Some people find it helpful to have
some sort of prayer list. That is, they write down the specific things that they want to pray about during
that particular session or day.

   There are a number of variations regarding this idea – daily lists, journals, semi-permanent lists.
Sometimes Christians use a semi-permanent list: so that they might be able to list things to pray about
regarding an on-going or periodic basis …situations, needs, people… are on the list and reviewed,
updated, and prayed about until resolved. There are some things that we should pray about on a
somewhat regular basis. And without such a reference, many of us would no doubt forget or neglect
some specific items.

   Others may find a journal to be helpful … writing down your prayers (not word for word, but a
summary of what you covered), almost like a diary entry … then following up to see how the prayer
was answered. This can be very encouraging to see how God does intervene and answers prayer, and a
daily journal may be helpful in showing you how to pray to God more effectively in the future (in other
words, you see what works, what gets results).
And instead of the two methods I just described above, some might want to make up a new list of
things to pray about every day.

   These are just ideas and recommendations, not a “thus saith the Lord”. But if you think that it would
help, why not at least give these recommendations a try? If you do decide to keep some sort of written
record of list of prayer subjects, don’t become too bound to them. Use them only as a guide to get you
started. For maximum prayer effectiveness, I believe that it is best to have some spontaneity.

Next Friday I will begin a discussion of another question … DOES GOD ALWAYS ANSWER OUR
PRAYERS?

Have a profitable Sabbath,
Fred