PRAYER CHANGES THINGS - Today's Perspective

PERSPECTIVES FROM DAVID’S 7 SECRETS

Chapter Three, “Live in the Moment” p.38, 45

PRAYER CHANGES THINGS

I’m not a theologian or a Bible scholar, but from personal experience, I know that prayer changes things.  As a young Christian at summer camp, we used to sing a chorus with that title. The lyrics were:

“Prayer changes things, Prayer changes things,

No matter how heavy the burden you bear

If you cast it on Jesus He’ll carry your care

And nothing can hinder the soul that will dare

For prayer changes things.”

I believe what Jesus said in Matthew 21:22, “If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer”, and again, in John 16:23, “My Father will give you whatever you ask in my Name”.  The thing is, there is an attitude we need to have if these things are to be true for us, because Jesus was serious about not asking in a way that brought attention to ourselves in public places (Matthew 6:5-8) and his brother James added, “…you do not receive because you ask with wrong motives” (James 4:3).  But he did add in James 5:16, “the prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective”.

David was careful in these things when he wrote in Psalm 19:14, “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer.”

Paul said in 1 Thessalonians 5:17, “pray continually”. That’s the whole verse!  I think the best way to do that is to practice the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives all the times.  In other words, if you are thinking about the Lord or if He is close enough that you feel you can just talk to Him at any moment, then you are practicing His presence in your life.

I believe David lived like that.  I believe that he was thinking about the Lord throughout the day and in every serious occasion in his life.  He said, “I am a man of prayer”, 

Ps. 109:4.

It is one of the secrets that made him a person after God’s own heart. Think about that!

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