What do your prayers sound like?

I became a believer when I was 21 years old. Now before that I spoke to God when I really really needed something. Kinda like of the scene in Along Came Polly: (it really starts at 1:00 if you want to skip the farting sounds)



I quickly found that this probably isn't the best way to approach God with my requests giving Him if then statements: if you do this....I will do this. Ever since I became a believer I struggled with the thought of prayer. First the position: do I kneel, throw my hands up, walk in a circle? Or what about what I say:

"Oh dear reverent mighty, sky God."
"Dear buddy, hows it going?"
"Dear 8 pound, six ounce baby Jesus in your golden fleece diapers."

I seriously didn't know how to approach this God of the universe. I knew that I had complete and free access to Him and could come in confidence (Eph. 2:12), but I struggled to figure out what to say. As I grew, I began to pray for my family, friends, those who were sick, etc.. I tried to keep a prayer list, but that never worked cause I either lost it or kept adding so many things that I couldn't keep track of them all. I also fell into the all too easy Christian trap of saying "hey man I'll pray for you." and not doing it. My prayer life became either inconsistent or it became too militant.
One other problem I have and still have is that I come to God with a list. By all means, trust me when I say that I am not saying you cannot come to God with urgent requests (hence the Greek word for prayer (two words proseuche or deesis) but I think sometimes we just come at God with a list of people and things for him to do.

This is what I want my prayers to look like or have in mind:
Ephesians 3:14-19:
"For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Paul prays not for material possessions, or that their church would grow or for more wisdom, or that they would get the money for a new church building but that they would grasp how much God loves them! Holy cow that is powerful. He wants more than anything that they know the extent (all the general measurements: wide, long, high, deep) of God's love for them. ANd that love gives them power, and it surpassing anything they have ever known or will know.
Love beyond any type of intellect, any smarty pants who can quote a million scriptures, or Greek or Hebrew, or whatever, God' s love surpassing it all.

Reflecting on that, I realized that grasping how much God loves you is the essence, the most basic foundation and solution to our issues. For instance sin is the opposition of God. Sin robs us of the understanding of how much God loves us, that our joy is rooted in that love. Satan deceives us into thinking that something else will provide joy, something other than the love of God. It was love in the first place that even gives us the ability to grasp God's love. (John 3:16)
I wish my prayers looked more like this. That I would pray that my ministry, my church, my liocal community, my nation, my government, my family, my friends, my congregants, would grasp how much Christ loves them. That transformation WILL occur when that happens, (trust me you can't help but change knowing your loved infinitely more than you deserve--it can bring you to tears). Knowing that love should move me to action, and should move me to praise no matter what kind of day I have.

Luckily GOd has been working on me and I am getting better about what I pray for and not getting too bogged down in my list, but taking time to simply say: Jesus help me to grasp how much you love me, since everything I do flows from that!

So what do your prayers sound like?

Be Blessed