How Jesus Teaches Us to Approach Prayer

To have a teachable spirit is to be ready to listen, and willing to sacrifice what we want for God’s purpose in our lives. “Give us each day our daily bread,” Jesus taught them to pray. We don’t have to doubt God will provide for us each day – we can count on it! As we pray, God already knows the needs we have and is familiar with the desires of our hearts. “Daily bread” is not food alone, but wisdom and truth, direction and perspective. God is faithful to give us the clarity we need to follow Christ daily, when we are ready and willing to learn.

When we don’t have the words to pray, we can simply utter the words Jesus has given us to say. His example of prayer to the disciples is not the only text from the Bible we can pray. Daily, there are dozens of Scriptures to help us communicate the depths of our hearts to God.

As my daughters grow from tweens to teens, I look for other mothers who have gone before me, and how they have prayed for their children. God is faithful to place people in our lives, even in the form of authors and teachers, who will guide and bring us one step closer to Him through the prayers we pray. Sometimes, I don’t know what to pray for my kids, but I am familiar with my worries. Even a search engine can spit out a list of Scriptures which coincide with what we are concerned about.

Praying Scripture is powerful. We do not serve a God of coincidence. There is a reason we are left with a piece of Scripture, Jesus’s words recorded by Luke in this case, to guide us in how to pray. The entirety of the Bible is full of prayer and powerful truth. Whether we need help with anxiety, or a healing of it on behalf of our child, we can pray Psalm 139 on their behalf, that they know who God says they are.

Prayer is powerful. Instead of getting lost in our thoughts, the Bible clearly tells us to take our thoughts captive and hold them accountable to the Truth. Prayer gives us the perspective to know which thoughts are rogue and which are of true concern and conviction from the Holy Spirit Himself. A daily habit of prayer grows our sensitivity to God’s voice as He speaks uniquely to us. As different as we all are on this earth, so are the specific purposes He has providentially set forth for each of us. Let us prayerfully, specifically, and intentionally pursue Him, and His purposes for us, daily.

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Meg is a graduate of Ashland University. She is a writer, author, editor, and digital content creator. She stepped away from her job in Internet Marketing in 2008 to raise her daughters, which gave her passion for writing a chance to shine through her blog, Sunny&80… Life within the Love of Christ. Meg has served as a Children’s Worship Team Leader and Middle School Leader for her local church. She founded and led the Breakfast Club Bible Study for Tweens, has served as a Young Life Leader and Committee Member, and led Women’s Bible Study. She has also volunteered as a content creator for her local church, studied Bible/Ministerial Training through Global University, completed COMPEL PRO Writers Training, and is Ethically AI Certified. A contributing writer for Salem Web Network since 2016, Meg is now thrilled to be a part of the team at Salem Web Network. You can find her entire library of books on her Amazon Author Page.