Journey into prayer
Every Christian would heartily agree that prayer is crucial if we are to truly have a relationship with God. Who wouldn’t want a prayer life that is vibrant and deep? The reality is most of us struggle with prayer, if we even pray at all. Keep in mind that there are no strict rules governing the habits of prayer, but more guidelines within which we have the freedom and duty to find a way to make it work for ourselves. This study is not about giving you a template to follow. It merely provides you suggestions that hopefully will help our prayer life just that little bit more.
In other words, this is not a bible study on prayer. We will still be reading a different passage of the Bible each week, but you won’t find the usual exegetical questions. That’s not to say we are bypassing our brains and going straight to the heart. It will still require thinking on our part, but of a kind that is more devotion than information. This means the questions generally have no right or wrong answers, only helpful ones!
Let’s begin with the Lord’s Prayer. Read Matthew 6:9-13
Matthew 6:9
Pray then like this:
“Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
10 Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread,
12 and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
How would you divide the passage into sections? Are there any obvious themes/structures?
Try to summarise the gist of the passage to send as a text message.
What word/phrase catches your attention the most? Paraphrase it and share with the group.
Pick one thing in the passage and spend 2 minutes now asking God for it.
What questions does this passage raise for you that you can take to God the rest of the day in meditation/prayer?
Share some prayer points in addition to the above and pray for each other!