Effective Praying

Luke 18:1: "Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up."


A lot of Christians talk about the importance of prayer, but few are diligent enough to experience it regularly. Oh, of course there are the trite, perfunctory repetitions that we say before a meal or during a church service, but the powerful prayers that usher us before the throne of God are noticeably absent in our lives.


One main reason for this dearth of an effective prayer life is our lack of faith that prayer really accomplishes anything. When we are faced with an issue of which we are not able to control ourselves, we rush to our knees to offer the petition to the Lord. As soon as the words have flowed from our mouths, we look up waiting for the portals of heaven to open and the very glory of God to appear with the heavenly hosts praising the Lord's immediate intervention for our supplications.

Then, when we see that nothing happens, we quickly lose hope in God answering our pleas. Many of us give up on praying, thinking that God has already made up His mind as to how our life events will unfold, and we then seem to float through life not tasting the fullness of God's provision, simply because we get to the point that we don't even ask Him.

In the passage above, Jesus used a parable to teach His disciples that they should never stop giving up on prayer. The story is of a widow who sought justice for a wrongdoing against her. As she approached the judge, who wasn't righteous and did not care about his subjects, she was relentless in her petitions to him for his intervention. And the more she returned to the judge, the more he became overwhelmed with her persistence. This unrighteous judge got to the point that her presence was wearing him out; therefore, he relented and granted her request although he did not care about the deplorable circumstances that she was facing.

Jesus used this imagery to communicate to His disciples that if an indifferent, pagan judge was willing to change his response, given the persistence of the widow, how much more would the Righteous Judge (the Lord) answer those who "cry out to him day and night" (18:7).

At the end of the chapter, Jesus had an encounter with a blind beggar who heard that Jesus was passing by and knew that He had the power to heal him. As the blind man cried out to Jesus for His mercy, the followers of Jesus rebuked the man for his vociferous comments. They told the man to keep quiet, but their warnings caused the man to be even more determined to get the Lord's attention. Jesus noticed the man's resolve, and He asked the disciples to bring the man to Him. Jesus then asked the man directly what he wanted. Jesus knew the answer already, but he wanted to see if the man was willing to petition Him for such a miracle . . . He wanted to see if the man had the faith to ask the Lord for His divine intervention.

When the man asked for his sight, Jesus honored his request and healed the man, saying "Your faith has healed you." The people were amazed as such a supernatural work and praised God for the miracle.

Now, wedged between these two accounts in Luke 18 of the need for persistent prayer are four essential ingredients to an effective prayer life:

1. Humility: In the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, one finds that the tax collector was justified and exalted before the Lord for His spirit of humility. This man felt himself unworthy to even look toward heaven, and cried that the Lord would simply have mercy on him for his sinfulness. This man HAD his prayer answered.

2. Faith: In the next story, Jesus is approached by several little children. The disciples rebuked these children for bothering the Savior, but Jesus reprimanded His disciples, saying that true believers must "receive the kingdom of God like a little child." We know that children will readily put their trust in someone or something quickly. They don't sit back and process through the information wandering if something is in fact worthy of their faith. When children pray, they believe that God hears them and that God will answer them. They don't have a fatalistic perspective, thinking that their prayers are worthless.

3. Surrender: The next ingredient introduced for an effective prayer life is surrender. In this story, Jesus is approached by a rich ruler who wants eternal life. Jesus, knowing that the man loved his wealth so much that he idolized it, instructed the man to sell everything that he had and follow Him. The man needed to remove everything in his life that had a higher priority than the One True God . . . tragically he refused to surrender.

4. Power of God in Salvation: Lastly and most importantly, the essential ingredient for an effective prayer life is the power of God working redemptively for our salvation. This work is accomplished solely through the love and power of God through His death and resurrection. As Jesus was raised on the third day from the grave, He demonstrated that He has power over sin and death, and is able to now open the channels of communication between His once estranged people and Himself. This is why the writer of Hebrews can write in 4:14-16: "Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are-yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." Jesus' victory over sin gives us the privilege of approaching His throne with our requests, knowing that we will not be repelled by His Holiness. As we seek His mercy with a humble, trusting spirit, He promises to "cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (I John 1:9). What a tremendous blessing it is to even have the opportunity to talk with the Lord.

What a tremendous word we have on prayer. To recap, let's be reminded of what we must do:

1. We need to be persistent in our prayers. God will hear us and answer us. To give up on prayer is to close the blessings that God desires to pour out upon us (see James 4:2).

2. We need to demonstrate humility, trust, and surrender to the Lord as we pray. God will not answer us if our prayers are intended to bolster the idol of "self" within us. This is clearly addressed in James 4:3: "When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures."

3. We need to remember that prayer is an awesome privilege, afforded to us through the sacrificial love of Jesus Christ, through His death and resurrection. To stop praying is to say that Jesus is not able or willing to intervene . . . we in effect say of God, "God you are not powerful enough to do that which we ask or you are too aloof to care about what we're going through." Neither conclusion is true, and in reality is a brazen criticism of His sovereignty and love for us.

Let's be a people of prayer . . . knowing that effective prayer is possible through obedience to His Word.