How is your prayer life? How would you describe the way you pray? Is your prayer sometimes boring or straight gutsy? Do you pray repetitively or passionately? Safe or dangerous?
This week I started reading this book by Pastor Craig Groeschel entitled "Dangerous Prayers" to get ready for the upcoming Proverbs 31 Online Bible Study. The subtitle hits me right on target too..and it says... "Because Following Jesus Was Never Meant To Be Safe." Being safe is like our comfort zone, since I was a child I know I have been a "scaredy-cat" as my 9-year old would say but I have always tried to live a braver life. Being an only child to a church Minister, I needed to learn to grow up fast, earlier than my contemporaries and be independent. I thought I have overcome being a coward (to put it mildly), but this book is telling me that I am not.
Just what does "Dangerous Prayers" mean? Can anybody pray like this? Why do I need to pray as such? Can I do it even? Isn't it a bit daunting praying this way? As I pick up and browse the book, these questions were continuously running through my mind.
As you might remember, for 2020 I chose the words "Praying More" as my focus for the year. My goal is to learn and develop praying more for others and praying more with others. I really want to go grow in prayer. So just imagine how thrilled I were finding out about this book and our next study: DANGEROUS PRAYERS!
Reading through the introduction section, this book has already started this spark in my heart and my spirit. It also made me look at how I am praying now and how I am living what I am praying. If I'll be honest I can be boring with my prayers, sometimes I don't even pray because I have so many excuses. Honestly, I have been trying to start a Prayer Journal for the last two years probably, and guess what? I still have not started one. Though, I have gone back to my prayer prompts and prayer requests list, and having those ladies from the Women's Ministry as prayer partners really disciplined me to be praying more with and for others (this is flattery now, cause those were great progress..) Thank you for lots of grace, Lord.
For some of us, that includes me, there are times that we pray because: (1) we have to, like it is a ritual for us; (2) we are into some kind of trouble; (3) we have been praying for something in particular; or (4) we need to show off how good we are at doing it. Where do you fall from these choices? I know it is hard to swallow that we do some of these, most of the time.
Pastor Craig said his prayers before were really lame. You heard it right! He used to say prayers that are "excruciatingly lifeless", very routine, repetitive and sometimes he even gets lost with his thoughts while actually praying as his mind roams around somewhere else. I know, right? Can you relate? I couldn't believe what I was reading either at the start but it could be the reality for most of us, am I right?
On this book, he talks about mainly three prayers, three dangerous prayers found in the Bible. Prayer that pleads, that pours their hearts out, that asks questions, that surrender everything to God, that bears all, that seek Him, that confesses fear, that speaks of an anxious heart, that feels for undecided spirit...these are what dangerous prayers are about.
I am prepared to learn to pray this way, God's way, to pray dangerously. I want to know and try how to lift up my very raw feelings up to God with boldness. To be real, to be bare and to lay it all. It is an outpouring of my all and what my real feelings that very moment as if I am talking to my Dad (Abba Father) face to face.
I love how he opened one of the chapter with his definition of what prayer is. Let us ponder through these words for a minute ... "Prayer is sacred communication, the language of longing, a divine dialogue between you and your heavenly Father, your Abba, your Daddy. When you pray, the God of the universe listens. And not only listen, but he also cares." Just how perfect that is. Imagine yourself face to face in the dinner table having a heart to heart talk or even just a daily "what kind of day did you have-kind-of conversation" with your Dad. HE listens. HE cares.
Dangerous Prayers were plea to God with sincerity. They can also be a guttural cry of anguish described in this book like a toddler having a tantrum. They are also those prayers that are downright honest, gutsy, fiery and straight to the point. He pointed out a few examples of dangerous prayers in the Bible like "praying for walls to fall, mouths of hungry lions to be shut, or prayer for the belly of a whale to open."
"God's people prayed whether they were giddy with joy or crushed by sorrow." - Craig Groeschel, author of "Dangerous Prayers"
There is yet so much to uncover from this book and if you are so incline to learn how to say Dangerous Prayers, join us on our Online Bible Study (OBS) with the Proverbs 31 Ministries. The OBS starts on April 6 but registration is now on-going. You can either join us on a big Facebook Community or Small Groups, to find out more CLICK HERE.
We just finished our Church Campaign this year focused on "The Lord's Prayer" and I think that this is a great example of a dangerous prayer. We studied and wrestled with this prayer for six long weeks, taking it apart line by line; petition by petition and looked at how GOD really wanted us to come to Him in prayer. He never said pray this repetitively but instead taught us how to pray, gave us an example, a guideline. I can never look and pray "The Lord's Prayer" the same way again without conviction. As I use each line, as I utter each petition it penetrates deep within me because it has now become so personal for me. This is exactly how praying dangerously means.
Dangerous prayers is putting myself out there to pray boldly and be able to say things to my loving Father openly. Pressing times like we are now, our fears and anxieties are going up beyond the roof and what better way to unload our weights than through exactly this way...praying passionately, boldly, dangerously.
".... Are you ready to pray daring, faith-filled, God-honoring, life-changing, world-transforming prayers? ...But be warned. There will be bumps. Attacks. Trials. Pain. Hardship. Discouragement. Even heartbreak. But there will also be the joy of faith, the marvel of miracles, the relief of surrender, and the pleasure of pleasing God." -- Craig Groeschel, author of "Dangerous Prayers"
The challenge of this book is real. It is a higher calling on praying. To be real with my prayers, I need to pray with more boldness. To be sincere with my petitions to God, I should pray with more passion. And to take hold of God's promises, I need to be praying with more faith.
Let us use this "shelter in place" opportunity, our self-quarantine time, our forced "40-day Lent" to come down to our knees, lift up our hands, use our voice, pray the Scripture, shout for help, unload our fears. Each day of our two-week quarantine let us develop a habit of praying with more boldness, passion and faith. What a better time to be spending time with our Loving Father and if you are really feeling gutsy, let us share this and teach our little kids about praying as brave and as passionate like in some of our Bible stories. Open your Bible everyday, pray often and ask ourselves what character of God was He revealing to us today? I urge you sisters to try and pray with more passion and with more faith...then just maybe you will be able to hear God's whisper or feel His nudge when you really spend more serious time with Him. He is just waiting for our dangerous prayers. I am starting mine!
Finally, the book takes on three major steps towards developing dangerous prayers that we can be comfortable with, paired with the three dangerous prayers in the Bible that Pastor Craig used, he encourages us to ask God to "Search Me, Break Me and Use Me".
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