"A Praying Life" (chapters 4-5)

A Praying Life: Connecting with God in a Distracting World

By Paul E. Miller

 

“Learn to Talk with Your Father” - Chapter 4

 

Asking Like a Child

• Everything and anything
• Repeatedly
• Transparently
• Knowing our Father gives good gifts

 

Believing Like a Child

• Confident of our Father’s Love
  • Asking persistently, confident in his goodness
• Confident of our Father’s Power
  • Everything possible
  • Without cynicism and unbelief
• Greater confidence in our Father’s power and love leads us to greater boldness to ask for the impossible.

 

Learning to Play Again

• Not overly concerned about praying with a set structure or pattern.
• More like the flow of a conversation with a person.
• Instead of letting your wandering mind be a distraction to your time of prayer, integrate your wandering thoughts into your conversation with your loving heavenly Father.

 

Learn to Babble Again

• Our Father understands our babbling, because he knows us and loves us.
• Don’t be embarrassed by how needy your heart is and how much it needs to cry out for grace. Just start praying.
• God has given us his Spirit to help us in prayer, when we don’t know what to say.

 

“Spending Time with Your Father” - Chapter 5

 

Spending Time with Your Father

• Even Jesus, the Son of God, needed times of prayer with his Father.
• He set aside times of prayer, in silence and solitude.
• Even after a busy day, he woke up early to go and pray with his Father.

 

Why Jesus Needed to Pray

• Clue # 1: His Identity
  • He was dependent on his Father.
  • If you know that you, like Jesus, can’t do life on your own, then prayer makes complete sense.
  • Jesus defines his identity completely in relationship to his heavenly Father.
  • Jesus’ prayer life is an expression of his relationship with his Father.
• Clue # 2: His One-Person Focus
  • When Jesus interacts with people, he narrows his focus down to one person.
  • This one-person focus is how love works.
  • In prayer, our heavenly Father should be our one-person focus.
• Clue # 3: His Limited Humanity
  • Though he was the Son of God, as man he had normal human limitations.
  • Jesus didn’t multitask. He focused on one thing and one person at a time.
  • He couldn’t focus on his Father and on the crowds at the same time.
  • He found solitary time to pray.

 

No Substitute for Time

• Jesus’ example teaches us that prayer is about relationship.
• When he prays, he is not performing a duty; he is getting close to his Father.
• To grow, any relationship needs private space, time together, and conversation.
• You don’t create intimacy; you make room for it.

 

Praying Like Jesus Prayed

• Jesus’ pattern of morning prayer follows the ancient pattern of the psalms.
• But this is not the only time to pray; Jesus also prayed in the evenings.
• Jesus prayed out loud in the pattern of the psalms.
• Praying aloud can add a reality and concreteness to our thoughts. We pray to a God who lives and hears.

 

Overcoming Objections

• Constant prayer and short prayers throughout the day can’t take the place of dedicated times of prayer.
• Busyness is no valid objection.
  • If you are not praying, then you are quietly confident that time, money, and talent are all you need in life.
  • A dependent life will prioritize times of prayer.

 

Take Baby Steps

• Don’t set impossible goals.
• Start slowly with attainable goals.
• Don’t multitask.
  • Get to bed.
  • Get up.
  • Get awake.
  • Get a quiet place.
  • Get comfortable.
  • Get going.
  • Keep going.