“The effective, fervent prayer of the righteous avails much. James 5:16 (NKJV)
Lately I’ve really enjoyed sharing about prayer. Truly prayer is one of the most powerful elements of our faith and it is available to all believers. Contrary to popular belief, prayer is not a chore or an action item on our spiritual to do list. When done with wisdom and understanding, prayer is transformed from being boring and repetitious into an extraordinary encounter with God. Why pray? Because God’s supernatural power engulfs us during times of effective prayer!
Effective: producing a result that is wanted; having the desired, intended effect.
Effective prayer is an opportunity to connect with God, it’s our time to ask from and listen to our Heavenly Father. It’s a time to deepen our relationship with the Lord through praise and intimacy. I truly believe that those of us who struggle with prayer do so not because our hearts are not in our prayers, but I believe the main reason that we don’t fully engage in prayer is because we aren’t seeing results when we pray.
Listen, I understand that it may seem selfish to want results when we pray, but think about it, why else would God give us prayer? He doesn’t desire religious works from us anymore, so prayer is not a religious obligation. Can I tell you that what God desires most is a relationship in which He can supernaturally impact our lives! So the question isn’t “should I pray?”, of course you should pray! The question should be, “how can I pray effectively to get the results that God wants for me?”
3 ways to pray effectively:
- Effective prayer is transparent.
- Effective prayer is unselfish.
- Effective prayer is more about God and less about us.
I’ll be writing about these three points over the next few weeks, but this week I want focus on transparent prayer.
Two Sundays ago I got a chance to share a message on prayer with our church, my message title was “Come Boldly” (you can watch the message here). As I shared my heart, I got an opportunity to be very transparent with the church, by that I mean that there were some moments where I shared very honestly and candidly about my life. You know the response that I got in those candid moments was so powerful, there was such a genuine exchange that happened between the church and I, and between God and everyone in the service.
If you know me you know that I’m not big on standing in front of others and making grand confessions, honestly I think that’s just awkward. What I am into is people being real, being genuine, acting with integrity and honesty. There is something so special about a heart that is honest and that loves integrity. The Psalmist says it this way
“May integrity and honesty protect me, for I put my hope in you.” Psalm 25:21 (NLT)
Transparent prayer is a prayer that has full confidence that our hope is solely in the Lord, and with that confidence we have nothing to hide from Him, from ourselves (trust me, we can really fool ourselves sometimes), or from others. Transparent prayer doesn’t mean we’re perfect, but it does mean that we allow God full disclosure about our shortcomings.
It’ll be in your transparency where the Lord will guide you. For many of us, in these moments we’ll be asked to do things that are difficult. Where we have wrongs, we’ll be challenged to commit to change them and move forward towards God’s best. In places of hurt and offense, we’ll be challenged to get forgiveness or give forgiveness. Whatever “tough love” the Lord gives you during your transparent prayers, I encourage you to not be fearful! Vulnerability with God gives Him free reign in our lives.
Transparent prayer allows God’s extraordinary power to transform us. None of us are perfect but transparency allows us to trust and rely on God and on one another. As you walk with integrity and honesty, always remember, your hope rests in the Lord!
Live Extraordinarily,
Jared
