Many times you must have questioned yourself about why you don’t pray often, even if you’ve the urge to. Sometimes you may plan to pray and end up falling asleep or talking with friends till it’s past your bedtime. You hear most of your Christian friends talk about how much they have prayed, some even have a prayer closet or space and use it to pray every single day, while you are still struggling to keep up with once a day prayer. Find yourself in this shoe? Well, we’ve got tips for you on how to improve your prayer life and help you pray often. Read till the end to find out.

Prayer

Prayer is the lifting of your heart and soul to God. When people hear prayer, most people think it is all about protocols and rules. Closing your eyes, kneeling on the head floor– because that is a must, and praying out loud. Many people that aren’t comfortable with it think it’s a big deal and hence tend to move away from it. It really shouldn’t be that way. Prayer is an intimate session with God and intimacy is relative according to your preferences. God also tells us in Colossians 4 vs 2 “Keep on praying and guard your prayers with thanksgiving.” Hence make it your moment to talk to your creator like it’s just you and him on a walk.

5 Tip To Help You Pray Better

Ever feel like you don’t know how to pray or you are not at the prayer level you pictured yourself in the past. Just think of Jesus teaching his disciples how to pray. 

1. Set A Convenient Prayer Time

Setting a prayer time may seem easy at first until you have missed it a couple of times. Sometimes we set prayers at times when it feels like we would be free or as the last thing of the day. Oftentimes we sleep off or end up coming in later than that time. That is why it is best to set payer times at conducive hours of the day. The time when you are most comfortable. It doesn’t have to be the last thing at night. You can say it just after a meal, when you still have all the energy. This also means you have to be disciplined enough to stick to it even at the worst times 

2. Steer Clear Of Unnecessary Distractions

It is one thing to set a standard prayer time for yourself and then it is another thing to actually pry yourself away from every other activity in order to pray. Distractions will come, yes, but your ability to maneuver those distractions and come to your prayer position should be learned. The word of God God us in Matthew Ch 26 vs 41 “Stay alert and pray so that you won’t give in to temptation. The spirit is eager, but the flesh is weak.” One way to pull yourself from distractions is by making a quiet corner, an altar in your home or having a prayer closet.

3. Take Up A Comfortable Position 

For you to have an effective prayer time, you need to take up a prayer position you are more comfortable with. During discomfort, our minds tend to shift away from the main focus and instead focus on the area of discomfort and that can make you shorten your prayer time so you can finally be comfortable. Many people may want to kneel and many others may have some form of knee or back pain and may want to sit back while many others may just want to lay their head on the bed after a long day’s work. As far as you have the utmost amount of comfort and focus, it’s fine. Except on occasions where you want to just kneel or stand.

4. Have A Prayer Partner

Many people find it difficult to pray and that may be due to so many reasons. The lack of prayer points, no time or distractions. Having a prayer partner comes in handy because it helps you keep in touch with your prayer life. This partner gives your soul the boost to pray. They can call, text and set up a meeting with you to discuss your spiritual life and how to become more prayerful. To get a prayer partner, you can confide in someone and tell them the difficulties you are facing as regarding your spirituality and as a recommendation of a good prayer partner or they could volunteer to help you themselves.

An old window Naomi a has lost both sons, Marlon and Kilion who both married Moabite women Ruth and Oprah. This old woman Naomi, was left with nothing but two Daughters in law. She sought to return back to her land, Judah, because the Lord has finally remembered and blessed the land. 

She turned back and urged her daughters-in law saying to them that they should return back to their people, their tradition and gods, for she too would return to her land empty-handed. They both blatantly refused, soon Oprah went back but Ruth remained steadfast and clung to her Mother in law and said these words;

“Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God.” Ruth Ch: 1 vs 16.

Sadly, Naomi felt the Lord has deserted her and made her life too bitter that she changed her name from Naomi to Mara because the Almighty made her life bitter.–Ruth ch: 1 vs 20

Sometimes in life, we are at crossroads on what we should do in certain situations and it makes us lose faith and sight of the things that matter.  A determined heart would always strive to look for a good side. This is illustrated here; because Ruth who was also a widow left all her properties and her family land to follow the one true God. Just as how the Book of Isaiah has told us…

“Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”– Isaiah Ch: 14 vs 18–19

When they both returned to Judah Ruth remained steadfast and hardworking and she found favour in the eyes of a man named Boaz and that was where the miracle started.

What Does it Show Us

Naomi only wanted what was best for her daughter in law Ruth that she even promised to find her a home. This singular act shows us about repaying kindness, how kindness can come back to those that give it out. It also expressed the belief of Karma that whatever goes around comes back around.  

There is ancient writing from different cultures that focuses on giving. Even the scriptures also tell us so…

“Give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.”–Luke Ch: 6 vs 38

One emphasis made from ancient cultures says that if you cast your bread on water, it would return to you many days later.

Boaz went on to marry Ruth and they bore a son who became a heir to Naomi. All the people praised the name of the lord on her behalf and they all said..

“He will renew your life and sustain you in your old age. For your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons, has given him birth.”–Ruth Ch:4 vs 15

Our Role To Play 

What do we need to do when we find ourselves in the most horrid situations that makes us want to give up? But we must learn from this story of Ruth and Naomi to always put God first and work very hard. Here are some ways to keep yourself going no matter how the going gets tough:

1. We need to hold on to God and believe that he know what is better for us. 

“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will free from you. Come near to God and he would come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinner, and purify your hearts, you double minded”– James Ch: 4 vs 7—8

2. You must look forward to better days and believe that one day God would Renew and sustain you at the appointed time.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”–Jeremiah Ch: 29 vs 11

Ancient Israel was in a state of continued backsliding. They kept crawling back to their old ways every time and they would rather kill the prophets than heed their warnings. In fact, God said to them through his prophet

Hos. 11:7

And my people are bent to backsliding from me: though they called them to the Most High, none at all would exalt him. 

Thank God though that just as much as they were bent on evil, God reached out to them even more. In God’s dealings with the Israelites, he patiently and consistently kept turning them to himself and guiding them towards a loving meaningful relationship with him. 

We see this in Amos chapter 4

Amos 4:12 Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.

God used corrective methods to turn His people toward Himself again: Just as now, God is interested in the salvation of our souls not just in our temporary comfort. And so, just like the Israelites, we too receive the invitation, “Prepare to meet your God!”

“PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD, O ISRAEL”

This is a message for God’s people, and not for the world:

“Cry aloud, spare not, show my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins.” – Isaiah 58:1

“I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” – Matt. 15:24

This is not a message for those who are not in Christ. This is a special message for God’s people. It is a message for those whom God refers to as ‘my people’. This message is for you and me. 

This message indicates a state of unpreparedness among God’s people. Just like the message to the Laodiceans, we are lukewarm. Having a form of godliness but no relationship with God.

Too many of our prayers are unfit and indicate a state of unpreparedness to approach the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Our hearts are far away. God is greatly concerned about the state of his people. Remember the tears Jesus shed over the city of Jerusalem? From the beginning of creation, God has longed to have a relationship with us. He longs to have us heed his words and follow in his path. That is why he keeps sending us the warning, he keeps pleading and he keeps calling us passionately to himself, to a relationship with him.

If Jesus wept over the condition of His ancient people, what would he do over our spiritual apathy and lack of spiritual unpreparedness? 

OUR ROLE

What are some of the things we can do for ourselves that would lead us towards gaining victory over self and sin and accepting Christ’s invitation to have a meaningful relationship with him?

Let us look at a few

1. We must purify ourselves even as He is pure. That means our personal life –

1 John 3:3

And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.

2. We must accept to be cleansed by Christ’s blood.  

 We must put on the robe of Christ’s righteousness. Of course, this is not referring to a physical article of clothing. It certainly is not pointing at a real garment. This robe of righteousness cannot be taken lightly because we see in the parable of the the ten virgins that there are serious consequences for lack of commitment.

This wedding garment and robe involves preparation of the heart and as we look at the world in a fallen state and God’s people in an alarming state of wickedness, we hear the invitation “Prepare to meet thy God”

 GOD’S MEETING PLACE WITH HIS PEOPLE

Where are some of the places where God can meet with us?

1. In the prayer closet:

When we call on God in our private times, we can be certain that God honours our request. Here we may make known to God what God alone should know. There are things in life which not even those close to us would understand if we would disclose them, but God does.

2. At the family altar:

“For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” – Matthew 18:20

God treasures this meeting place, and we ought to treasure it too.

3. In the church which is properly called “the house of prayer”:

It is the place where the Lord desires to meet with all His people. In the new testament, we receive the admonition to not despise the gathering of the brethren. God wants to meet with.

4. But most and best of all, the Lord wants to meet us at the throne of mercy, the mercy seat:

“Let us come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” – Heb. 4:16 

How it must disappoint the Lord when we fail Him at the mercy seat! We do stand in great need to meet the Lord every day; I, personally, do not know what I would do if I were denied that privilege. Those, who refuse to frequent the throne of mercy, will cry to the rocks and the mountains to come hide them from the face of him who has left the throne of mercy and sits on the judgment throne.

The message is to us: “Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel”: Let us heed it and make the needed preparations to meet the Lord. If we do, we shall not be afraid to meet Him when He comes the second time to receive us.