Holding to Truth

holding to truth in love for the building up of the Body of Christ

3 Vital Practices to Enrich Your Prayer Life

Have you ever noticed your experience of prayer becoming routine or stale? I know I have.

Praying the same old prayers, without having a fresh touch with the Lord Jesus, can cause you to lose interest in prayer and possibly even quit praying. What a loss!

But what can you do to invigorate and sustain your prayer life? …

Match prayer with thanksgiving, praise, and worship!

Psalm 100:4  says,

“Enter His gates with thanksgiving, / His courts with praise; / Give thanks to Him; bless His name.”

From this verse, I was impressed with a marvelous progression—beginning with thanksgiving, continuing with praise and consummating with blessing, or worship.

First, thank God for His grace and for all things.

It’s really good to enter the Lord’s presence with thanksgiving. This is especially true at the beginning of each day.

In Ephesians 5:18-20, Paul speaks of being filled in spirit and continues with various kinds of speaking, including singing, psalming, and giving thanks.  Verse 20 says,

Giving thanks at all times for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to our God and Father.”

From my own experience, I can confirm that giving thanks is not just an outflow of being filled in our spirit with the Lord Jesus. It’s also a way to be filled with Him. (See note 1 on verse 19 in the Recovery Version).

A note on this  verse goes on to say that,

“We should give thanks to God the Father not only in good times but at all times, and not only for good things but for all things. Even in bad times we should give thanks to God our Father for the bad things.”(Holy Bible Recovery Version, Eph. 5:20, note 1)

We should simply thank God for whatever we can…for a new day to live, for air to breathe and for food to eat. Even in our suffering situations, God’s grace—God in Christ as our enjoyment—is available to us.  The situations may be difficult, but hidden behind them is a sweet visitation of God’s grace. We just need to begin to thank God regardless of our outward situation.

Just take a moment right now to thank the Lord for anything that comes up in your heart. You may want to pray,

“Father, thank you for all that You have done for me. Thank you for giving me my life and a heart to seek You. Thank you for revealing Your Son, Jesus Christ, to me so that I could believe into Him. Thank you for saving me—for forgiving me of all my sins and for giving me Your divine life so that I could become Your child. Thank you for giving me this new day to love You, to know You more, and to grow up in Your life.”

Second, praise the Lord for His acts.

After entering the Lord’s gates with thanksgiving, we need to go on “to enter into His courts with praise.” Giving thanks is basic. Offering praise requires a deeper appreciation.

Practicing to thank God—for food, clothes, and family, etc.—is something even the youngest children should be helped to do. Giving thanks is a real preservation to them—as well as to us. But we need to go further—to progress from thanks to praise. This requires that we see God’s acts from His Word, to know what He has done and is doing.

In Lessons for New Believers, Witness Lee says,

“The emphasis in giving thanks is to thank God for His grace, and the emphasis in praising is to praise God for His acts. Through prayer, we not only touch God’s grace but also witness God’s acts. God’s grace requires thanksgiving, and His acts require praises. We can praise by saying, “Lord, I praise You. You are the wonderful Lord who does wonderful things. Even as I tell You of my difficulties, I sense that You have already taken care of this matter. Your promise is sufficient for me. Praise You!” With respect to the grace of God, we need to give thanks, and with respect to the acts of God, we need to offer praises.” (Lessons for New Believers, Lesson 7, pp. 103-104)

 Third, worship God for Himself.

Finally, we need to advance even higher to simply worship God for Himself—for who He is and even that He is.

Psalm 29:2  says,

“Ascribe to Jehovah the glory of His name;  Worship Jehovah in holy splendor.

Here it is no more a matter of thanking God for His grace or praising Him for what He does.  Now it is a matter of worshipping God Himself.

Opening our mouth to thank and praise the Lord, delivers us from our murmurings and reasonings. Such prayers of thanks and praise elevate us out of our earthly concerns, and enable us to set our mind on the things which are above where Christ is (Col 3:1-2). Such speaking ushers us into our deepest part—our spirit.

Then— in our spirit—we can offer God the true worship that He is seeking. John 4:24 says,

 “God is Spirit and those who worship Him must worship in spirit…

In How to Enjoy God and How to Practice the Enjoyment of God, Witness Lee says,

 “As we touch Him, remain in Him, behold His loveliness, converse with Him, inquire of Him, wait on Him, and muse upon Him, we should worship Him. We should worship Him in our spirit and with our whole being. We should attune our entire being to His holy splendor and worship Him in holy splendor (Psa. 29:2). We should prostrate ourselves before Him and offer Him our worship.” (p. 64)

We can simply worship  God Himself by saying,

“Father, we worship You for Who You are.  You’re the eternal One and the source of eternal life. You are love and You are light. You’re the transcendent One. You’re ever new and fresh. You’re faithful. You’re righteous and You’re holy. You’re the only wise God. We give all our worship to You.”

Ultimately, why is such vital, God-contacting prayer so important?  It’s crucial because it affords God the  opportunity to work Himself into us and to thoroughly mingle Himself with us so that we may become one with Him and so that He may be expressed through us both personally and corporately. May the Lord bring us more deeply into such a life of prayer.

Further Resources:

Photo Credit: Muffet

 

About Tom Smith

Hi. My name is Tom Smith. I'm the writer behind Holding to Truth in Love, and I love the Lord Jesus and His life-giving Word. Please feel free to send me an e-mail through the contact page if you have any questions. I hope you'd take a moment to subscribe to the Holding to Truth blog. Then you'll be sure not to miss a post. Thanks!

3 Replies

  1. Sairusi Raikoro

    Hello,

    I am Sairusi Raikoro, from Fiji an island in the South Pacific. I just recently started learning about this church life and I would be very grateful if you could send me future posting on my email.

    Praise Lord Jesus for his word! Jesus Lord you are the real word.

    Thanks.

  2. Abang Sam

    I was impressed and I want to get closer to God.

  3. Kim

    Sometimes praying becomes soo difficult. I could go a whole week without praying and I know within my spirit that am soo far from My FATHER.
    Thank you for this post. We all need encouragement in this busy, money seeking lives.

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