Alongside reading God's Word, prayer is something we know we should be doing as Christians. But when your faith isn't on fire and you aren't coming off of a mountaintop experience with God, what do you pray for? Do you simply go through your day only to pause and bless your food or do you announce your laundry list to God each morning and hope for the best?
If you're longing for a prayer life full of power and persistence instead of feeling like it's lukewarm here are 5 prayers to pray to thrive in your faith:
Prayers of Supplication
God is a giver of good gifts! He loves when we go to Him as our trusted Father and all powerful God and ask. Prayers of supplication are all about asking. For some, this might come naturally. For others, it might feel challenging and bring about many emotions as you think about asking God for something.
Jesus encourages us in the Bible to ask and to ask repeatedly. God is ready and available to respond to you. Ask Him to in prayer!
"Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened" (Matthew 7:7-8 NIV).
2. Prayers of Thanksgiving
Giving thanks to God is the natural response to answered prayers. Prayers of thanksgiving are simply thanking God for the ways in which we have experienced His presence and favor in our lives. As you thank God you'll often notice more and more things you are grateful for and experience joy in the presence of a generous God.
3. Prayers of Adoration
The difference between adoration and thanksgiving is that
thanksgiving responds to what God has done and adoration responds to who God is.
When we feel like we don't have much to be thankful for or aren't experiencing God in a certain way in our lives that we long to, we can turn to prayers of adoration that encourage us to focus on the truth of who God is. He is always the same, so even when we feel like we are in a season of lack, we can adore Him as our provider, and when we are in a season of sickness we can adore Him as our healer.
4. Prayers of Confession
This area of prayer is often overlooked in Christian payer lives mainly because it's not necessarily categorized as a "fun one."
However, I think this is one of the most rewarding ways to pray. If you have been a Christian for a long time, you might think you don't have any blatant sin in your life. But is it worth being right with God if you simply want to confess an unkind thought you had while scrolling social media or bypassing an opportunity to connect with someone for the sake of your own convenience.
Invite God to search your heart and make a regular practice of confessing to God and being fully open and honest before Him.
5. Prayers of Intercession
If you attend a small group you likely write out prayer requests from the people in your group. If you are a person of prayer, you likely offer to pray for people in your life regularly. But how often do you specifically set aside time to pray for those people?
Intercession goes far beyond just praying for people we know. Ask God to invite you into more opportunities to intercede with a kingdom focus. In one season of my life, I couldn't sleep well regularly. A friend asked me to ask God why and invite Him to call me to prayer if He was keeping me awake. The next night, when I couldn't sleep I asked God to direct me to who to pray for and found myself praying for a specific country with oppressed Christians.
If you're looking for more areas to intercede in pray for your government, leaders of your local schools and churches, your community, specific countries or areas of the world in crisis, for refugees, widows, orphans, and for the lost to find Jesus. There is truly no end to the options for intercession and imagine meeting someone in heaven from a part of the world you've never been to but getting to say, "I have been praying for you!"
Get the rest of this Christian life tookit series in your inbox - Subscribe!
Have you heard about my book "how much more?" It's all about how God wants to hear about your hopes & dreams! Get your copy!