Birchwood Community Church

Why do it? Why should we pray when God knows everything anyway? Shouldn’t we just God do stuff without bothering Him? What is the point in praying?

I don’t know if you ever think like that. I guess the simple answer is that Jesus said we should pray and even pointed out “that your Father knows what you need before you ask Him.” (Matt 6 v 8). God is neither unwilling to hear prayer, nor incapable of meeting our needs, but why then does He want us to pray?

I like Calvin’s answer to this question. He says “Believers do not pray with the view to informing God about things unknown to Him, or of exciting Him do His duty, or of urging Him as though He was reluctant. On the contrary, they pray in order that they may arouse themselves to seek Him, that they may exercise their faith in meditating upon His promises, that they may relieve themselves from their anxieties by pouring them out to Him. In a word (Christians pray) that they may declare that from Him alone they hope and expect, both for themselves and for others, all good things.”

In other words, prayer is for our benefit. When we pray we get God’s view on things and akign ourselves with Him. We recognise that we need Him and that He is a good and loving God.

Simple? Not really. Maybe the idea is simple, but putting it into practice isn’t - at least in my experience. What about when God doesn’t seem to answer? When the apostle Paul talked about prayer, he wrote that he was “struggling for you … and for all who have not met me personally.” (Col 2 v 1) Keeping going and praying is sometimes hard work but we need to keep on keeping on.

So what am I learning? That we need to persist in praying if we are to stay on track, especially so when we have so much to do. Building well is more than just making a good start.  Growing is a lot more about how we live rather than just getting born. 

I like the title of Bill Hybel’s book “Too busy not to pray”. Aren’t you and me in that position?