Our Attitude in Prayer
Prayer is an essential part of evangelism. You could say it’s “half the battle.” Since we want God to hear our prayers, let’s pray in the following way:
With a pure heart
This is the only way to be sure God hears us. David said in Psalm 66:18-19, “If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. But God did listen! He paid attention to my prayer” (NLT). Unconfessed sin in our hearts keeps God from hearing our prayers. If we get rid of anything hindering our relationship with God (by confessing it to Him), we know He will hear us. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (I John 1:9 NASB).
With a humble heart
A humble spirit is also required for us to truly pray so He will hear us. In 2 Chronicles 7:14, God tells us, “If my people … will humble themselves and pray . . . I will hear” (NLT). And David said, “A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise” (Ps. 51:17b NASB). Pride and arrogance in formulas and set phrases, or even in not using them, are just that—pride and arrogance. Either way, we offend God. He is not a puppet on a string or a genie in a bottle for us to command to do our will. As Jesus said in the garden, “Not as I will, but as You will” (Matt. 26:39 NASB). We should approach God by first acknowledging that He is sovereign. We are His servants. So our focus should be on His will and His purposes. He is Lord.
Passionately
Praying without passion is the same as meaningless repetition (Matt. 6:7). It takes up our time but doesn’t do anything. To pray fervently, we must know what we are praying about (whether it’s a person, a situation, or a community). That means taking time to find out. The more we learn, the more we will not only begin to see it from God’s perspective, but also feel what He feels.
Persistently
Persistence is a quality highly valued in Scripture. In Luke 18:1-8, Jesus tells us of a widow who kept “bugging” the judge till justice was done. In fact, Luke prefaced the story with the words, “Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart” (v. 1 NASB). That should be our attitude, especially in intercessory prayer. We should not rest until God answers our prayer, whether what we prayed for happens or not.
Boldly
“This is the confidence [or boldness] which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him” (1 John 5:14, 15 NASB). Knowing that He hears our prayers and will respond, according to His will, should make us bold as we pray.
“Therefore let us draw near with confidence [or boldness] to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16 NASB). So, what are we waiting for?
Dependently
One of the main purposes of prayer is to declare our dependence on God. It is His will we want, more than anything we could want or ask for, for ourselves. We are not even praying that God would “make people Christians.” As we pray, He will start the process of drawing people to Himself. Our job is to pray, as He taught us, that His will “be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10 NASB). 