Prayer

Prayer

What does it do? 

What are the benefits? 

Why do it?

 Who is it for? 

My aim is to answer these questions in this post!

What is the purpose of prayer? I would say that prayer allows us to have a conversation with our God and prayer is in some ways is easy. To pray we just speak, aloud or in our minds and God hears. This is easy; The challenge comes with listening to God.

Below is a quote from the Goon Show spoken by Ned Seagoon and another, quoted by Kallistos Ware.

"Hello, Hello! Whose speaking?"

"You are speaking"

I fear that far too often we speak and don't listen. We complain that we don't hear God's voice but are not patient to listen. Sadly his voice is quiet and requires patience to hear. So often we have much to say and interrupt God. We ask for this and that but don't listen to what he has to say to us. This sort of prayer whilst making a good start is deeply flawed.

We believe as Christians that Christ died so that humans can have a relationship with God the Father. This is something that blows my mind. How do we build this relationship?

By reading the scriptures we get an idea of who God is and we find our place in creation. It said by some that the bible is a manual for life, but I think that this is an over simplification. It is indeed part of the purpose as we find in 2 Timothy but not the full story. The bible tells us who this God is and why we exist, from Genesis to Revelation.

If you went to interview someone famous you would likely do so research into the person. It is an issue of respect to the person. It allows a rapport to be made between interviewer and interviewee. The bible allows us to get ourselves right before we speak with God. Despite this I suspect we often get things wrong!

When we speak to God what do we talk about? The Psalms could be seen as the recordings of
prayers of David. In them we see him speaking to God in every possible situation. A case of "Hi God, this is how my day has been. Can you sort things out for me". In a previous post I went through the Lord's Prayer, that acts as a guideline for what should be in our prayers. We often pray that God would be in our situations and protect us from harm. Alas frequently it is all too easy to forget to say thank you when he does.

So far I have attempted to give a overview of prayer in our personal lives. I will now try and seek to look at how praying for others works.

The most common reason that we pray for other people is either that they are ill, or that they need a car parking space! I believe that only one of these types of prayer are valid! By praying for the sick we follow in the example of Jesus, although we have to ask God to do the healing in the form of prayer as opposed to using our own power.

When we pray we often use the words "in the name of Jesus". Why do we do this?

I believe that when we say"in the name" we actually mean "I am praying as Jesus would do." Of course this is quite a bold thing to do and maybe we too often do it! Jesus states that when we pray in his name to the father, that that we pray for will happen and in the context of above this makes a lot of sense. It can also lead to a lot of dissapointment when we use these words in our prayers and nothing happens. The reason, I suspect, that nothing happens is because what we are praying for is not the will of God in such cases.

To work out what the will of God is requires us to seek his voice and this brings us back to having a relationship with him. When we do have a relationship we find out what he wants us to be praying for and we see the miracles that come from such prayer. Prayer is a discipline that takes patience but is ultimately rewarding.

Worship

I have spent the last couple of weeks thinking on this topic, since being challenged by a friend to write a post on it.

Firstly lets look at how Worship is defined in the modern dictionary and then I shall try and set the topic in a biblical context.

worship

[wur-ship] 

noun

1. reverent honour and homage paid to God or a sacred personage, or to any object regarded as sacred.

2. formal or ceremonious rendering of such honor and homage: They attended worship this morning.

3. adoring reverence or regard: excessive worship of business success.

4. the object of adoring reverence or regard.

5. ( initial capital letter ) British . a title of honor used in addressing or mentioning certain magistrates and others of high rank or station (usually preceded by Your, His,  or Her  ).

 http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/worship

In my previous post I spoke of God being a jealous god to whom all praise should be given. In many ways this would appear to make life easy, that is to say that we now only have one direction to pray to. I wonder is this how many people see their Christian lives?

You go to Church in your best clothes, you sing the songs, say the prays, give money to the offertory(possibly as little as possible!), take communion and then get home having done your bit of worship for the week. I hope that most people who go to Church do not follow this way of thinking, although in my cynical and unpleasant moments I have wondered along these lines.
A few months ago some American friends asked me how many people in Britain are Christian. I had to say that I could not say. I have been too judgemental on peoples reason's for going to Church in the past and felt embarrassed when I realised I was wrong.
 
In the film Frozen love is defined as "Putting others needs before your own" and this I would say is a key part of Worship. To Worship should contain an element of sacrifice. In the Old Testament God requires sacrifice or offering to enable the forgiveness of Sins and as an act of worship. When giving an offering it is made clear that the offering should be the best possible. That is to say that God expects the best we can give. How often does our worship cost us? I believe that worship is to put the needs of God before our own.

In the New Testament we are given to contrasting examples, one being an act of worship and the other being an act of pseudo-worship. The example of real worship is shown in the case of the widow's offering. Here is someone who on the face of it has given very little, but in fact has given everything. You can imagine people looking at this woman in disdain at how little she gives and I think it is for this reason that Jesus has to explain the background. This brings us to the case of pseudo-worship, the case of Ananias and Sapphira. Here are two people who have given some money to the early church. This seems commendable, until you find out that they haven't given everything as promised. They have made the appearance of doing good works without the reality to back it up. They die because they perpetuated a myth of giving all to God, they let themselves lie to God. God isn't interested in outward appearances, they don't really matter, he is more interested in your heart.

We should not see worship as something that ends when we finish our prayer, or leave a Church building after a service. No; worship should be at the heart of everything we do. How often do we think of Work as a part of our worship to God? I have found that when I commend my work to God that I work better, knowing that by working for others I am offering myself to the service of God, I work in order that I might do something that pleases God. As I work I find time to pray and think, this is as much worship as singing hymns and worship songs. To worship you have to desire to do the will of God and to desire his presence.