Taking Prayer For Granted

The thing that I struggle with most, but wish I struggled with the least is probably prayer. I simply don't pray as much as I should. I heard someone say once that "5 minutes of prayer is better than 5 hours of work." Yet, I still think the answer to my struggles is to try a little harder. At some point or another, it seems we all take prayer for granted. But this morning as I was praying, I realized something so simple, yet so powerful: God not only hears my prayers, He knows my heart.

Have you ever tried to explain how you feel to someone, but just couldn't come up with the words that accurately expressed what was going on in your heart? That doesn't happen in our prayer life, because God already knows what is in our hearts. But it goes even deeper than that. The Spirit takes those things that we just can't express - or frankly, don't understand - and conveys them to the Heart of the Father in accordance with God's Will.

"Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God." - Romans 8:26-27

This verse is so rich in theological and practical implications that would never be able to be contained in one blog post. But let's try to unpack this just a little bit.

Those first few words are some of the most encouraging words in all of Scripture to me: "the Spirit helps us in our weakness." I don't know about you, but I feel pretty weak in prayer sometimes.

What can a sinful man say to a Holy God? What about those times when I'm just exhausted from life and the last thing I want to do is labor in prayer? Or when I've just given in to my flesh and feel too dirty to approach the throne room of God? What about days when my suffering is so great, I'm not sure what good prayer will do? In all of these times and more, The Holy Spirit helps us; by praying for us and through us.

And in those times when I don't know how to express what's going on in the depths of my heart, the Spirit hears, interprets and conveys those things to the Father. Not only that, The Spirit knows my desire for the will of God and so even when I don't pray for God's Will, the Holy Spirit does so on my behalf. The Spirit does all of this on a level that even human language cannot reach. There literally are no words for the exchange that happens between the Holy Spirit and the Father; all as a result of our prayers.

That is why I titled this post: "We Take Prayer For Granted." Not only do we have unlimited access to the Throne Room of the King of Kings. Not only does he bear with us in our weakness and hear our misguided prayers; He hears our hearts cries and intercedes on our behalf. He prays for us and through us. Why would we not spend more time in prayer? Why would we not tap into such an experience with God?

I am finding that the thing helping me to pray more is to pray that I would pray more. I know, that last sentence is a little confusing. But we should all be praying that God would give us the desire to pray more. You could say it this way: "Pray more that you would pray more." Ask the Holy Spirit to intercede on your behalf in accordance with God's will as it relates to your prayer life. Ask Him to help you not take it for granted.

Don't ever think that there is a weakness in you that disqualifies you from praying. The Spirit is in you to help you in that; literally to come alongside of you as we see in the Greek language of verse 26.

Praying too little is not an insurmountable weakness. Not knowing what to pray for is not an insurmountable weakness. Not knowing God's Heart well enough is not an insurmountable weakness. Whatever you think is holding you back from praying as you should and God working through your prayers is simply a lie that you are believing. The Holy Spirit is there to overcome every excuse, every obstacle, every mistake.

Stop making excuses, stop talking about it and pray about it instead.