Dear Church,
I want you to be certain of what prayer is.
Linda and I were married in August of 1973. In 2025 we will have been married fifty-two years!
When I met Linda, I was twenty-one years old, a college student, and a new follower of Jesus. I began attending a campus ministry. I joined one of the small groups, which met weekly. I attended large group Bible studies and worship meetings. I began forming new friendships. In that context, one of them was with Linda.
I lived with my parents, thirty miles from campus. I commuted to classes three days a week. I was freed from alcohol and drug abuse. To my parents’ amazement, I was reading my Bible. To my astonishment, I became the youth leader in the Lutheran church we attended. My life was changing. I would never be the same again!
One evening, I found myself struggling with some issues in my life. I had questions I was praying about. I was in the beginning stages of learning how to listen to the voice of the Lord. I remember thinking, “Who could I call that would listen to me?” A few names of new friends came into my mind. Linda’s was one of them.
Intuitively, I felt she would understand what was happening in me. I called her. She listened, while I talked. She talked, and I listened. I felt she was grasping what I was trying to say. I was being helped by her responses.
Prayer is like this. Dallas Willard defined praying as talking with God about what God and I are thinking and doing together. Martin Luther King defined praying as “conversation with God.” Prayer is a dialogical give-and-take, between me and God.
Prayer is listening as well as speaking. In prayer, discernment precedes decision making. One of the things that happens in praying is finding out what the Father wants us to do. We see this in verses like Jeremiah 42:2-4. 2 Jeremiah the prophet and said to him,
“Please hear our petition and pray to the Lord your God
for this entire remnant.
For as you now see, though we were once many,
now only a few are left.
3 Pray that the Lord your God will tell us where we should go
and what we should do.”
4 “I have heard you,” replied Jeremiah the prophet.
“I will certainly pray to the Lord your God as you have requested;
I will tell you everything the Lord says
and will keep nothing back from you.”
Brothers and sisters, as you enter into the great conversation with God, God will tell you where you should go, and what you should do.
Love, PJ
QUESTIONS
What is God saying to you, about you?
What does God want you to do, today?
Where is God leading you?
How are you collaborating with God?
(From my book 31 Letters to the Church on Praying.)
