As I have mentioned before, I am married to an amazing man! He has a tender heart and desire to share a knowledge of God's Word with our church family and others! He is also an awesome daddy to Timothy! I am so excited that he agreed to take time out from his busy church schedule to write a guest post about prayer.
I think we all realize how important prayer is, yet we still struggle with it in our lives. I know this has been the case in my own life. In fact, I have often wondered if I have A.D.D. because my mind seems to wander so much! Well, this past February at a Pastors conference in California, the Lord laid this "prayer plan" (for lack of a better term) on my heart. My theme verse for it is Isaiah 26:3, where God gives a "perfect peace" that I desire to have in my life. I hope that this might be a help to you as you look at your own prayer life. It follows an acrostic for the word "peace":
P--Perspective (my worship of who God is, what He did for me that day, thankfulness of heart, etc.)--this gets my perspective off of the earthly and on the heavenly
E--Exhortation (my prayer requests for others, lifting them up before the Lord)--this involves praying for the people the Lord lays on my heart that day in my prayers
A--Ability (my prayer for the Lord's strength and help in specific areas of my life and others lives)
C--Confession (of the sins and failures in my own life)
E--Enlightenment (prayer for the Lord to take off the spiritual blinders I allow in my life that cause me to miss seeing His hand in my life, and likewise for others; wisdom for decisions, etc)
As I close, a few other suggestions of help:
1. Pick a prayer time where you can really focus with minimal distraction. For me this has been key! I pray when Rachel and Timmy are asleep, and right before I go to bed. I am a night person and this is when I can think the best. It would never work at night for Rachel...lol
2. I don't feel I have to run through a specific "list" of request every time. I pray for the things the Lord really lays on my heart at that time, and this helps keep my prayers from being so routine.
3. Don't think you have to be the one speaking all the time, allow God to speak to you. Sometimes just meditate on who He is. It will be amazing how the Spirit uplifts and speaks to your heart. I do this especially during the "p" (perspective part of my prayers)
Well, this has been a help to me and maybe it will be for you also. Prayer will always be a struggle for each of us (Matt. 26:41) but the blessings far outweigh the difficulties!
Blessings,
Adam