How to PraySample

How to Pray  

Welcome to ‘How to Pray’: a 21-day devotional journey with Pete Greig. Together, we’ll explore the vast and beautiful subject of prayer. 

In Luke 11, Jesus’ disciples ask him one of the greatest questions of all time: Lord, teach us to pray. In response, Jesus gives them the greatest prayer in world history: The Lord’s Prayer. 

Over the next few days we’ll explore this profound prayer and seek to develop our own healthy, sustainable rhythms of conversation with God.

This devotional guide is based on Pete Greig’s book ‘How to Pray’ and is an introduction to this vast subject.  It’s for people who may not have studied theology and don’t consider themselves ninja prayer warriors, but who would still like to grow in their relationship with God. It’s going to be a wild and wonderful journey of discovery!  “Lord teach us to pray.”

As you set out on the many paths of prayer, the Lord is going to join you on the journey. (He’s putting his boots on right now.) He’s going to walk with you in silence, and talk with you too. The conversation will ebb and flow. He will tell you things you never knew, and ask you things you never told. Occasionally you’ll lose your sense of him, but not for long. Sometimes he will suggest a rest or a particular path, but mostly he will follow your lead, accompanying you every step of the way until eventually you come full circle, arriving home, knowing yourself known.

We’re taking a map with us, of course: the world’s most famous prayer—the Lord’s Prayer—given to us by Jesus himself for this very purpose: to teach us to pray. 

In these old, familiar words we are going to discover nine different paths of prayer: Stillness, Adoration, Petition, Intercession, Perseverance, Contemplation, Listening, Confession and Spiritual Warfare.

And our journey is going to be paced around an easy, four-step rhythm: P.R.A.Y. —Pause, Rejoice, Ask, Yield. Try not to take its four steps as hard-and-fast rules—rungs on a ladder to some Seventh Heaven; they are more like dance-steps: fluid, interactive, and open to creative interpretation. 

Give P.R.A.Y. a chance and it’ll lend your prayer life a light structure and an easy flow, whether you’re on your own or praying in a group. 

As we begin our journey together, let’s take a moment now to pause, pray, and ask, just like the disciples: Lord, teach us to pray.