Prayer. Such a small but powerful word. And to access its power, you simply must do it. You want to do it. You know you need to do it. Your own spirit calls to you, asking you to do it. And it’s the one thing that can actually change you and your situation. It is the one thing that can bring peace into your chaos. But it won’t happen by itself. You must do it. Just as keys are only useful when you use them, so is prayer.
Prayer is the ability to talk face to face with the one who created the galaxies. The one who formed the heavens and the earth with just a word. The one who owns it all and desires to share it. The one who imagined you and dreamed a good plan for you and knows how to bring it to pass. The one who loves you so personally that He gave His life just for you so that you could live that life He planned in grand fashion.
In Ephesians 6:18 (NIV), Paul says, “And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.” That covers it all. He tells us to pray about everything, anything, all things, and keep praying.
He also tells us how to do it. By the Spirit. Why is that important? Because in Romans 8:26 (NKJV), we read, “Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.” That is so comforting. Even when we don’t know what to pray, the Holy Spirit does. If we will open our mouths and allow Him to pray through us, even when it only sounds like groans, God hears me and knows what I need.
Then the promise is that He not only hears us, but He answers us. 1 John 5:14-15 (NIV) says, “This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.”
We are instructed to pray. It’s like Naaman, the leper, in 2 Kings 5. When the Prophet told him what he needed to do to be healed, he didn’t want to do it. His servant reasoned with him and said to him that he would have done it if the Prophet had told him to do a hard thing. Why not do the simple thing he instructed? So Naaman realized he was wrong, did what he was told to do, and received his miracle.
God is your Father, and He is a good father. The closeness and nearness we desire from Him are found in prayer. You can’t have a relationship where there is no talking. It’s not a hard thing we are called to do. The answers you desire are found in Him. The help you need is found in Him. The breakthrough you are fighting for is found in Him. Everything you could ever need or want is found in Him. The key to accessing it all is prayer.
If you want this year to be different, become a person of prayer. It’s very simple, yet so many miss it. Don’t be one of them. Let the Lord begin to direct your life in the plan He designed just for you. You can start right now, right where you are. All you have to do is pray. Your answers are waiting.
Jaime Luce
