016 - Prayer Habits, Part IV

As we conclude our series of course-correcting some of our prayer habits, make sure you read this again: God doesn’t have a perfect definition of prayer.

He just wants to connect with us meaningfully and honestly. The goal of this series hasn’t been to shame you or guilt you into praying the “right” way. The goal is to help us recognize where we’ve gotten a little off-track in the way we pray SO THAT we can adjust and find more joy and meaning in the time we spend with God in prayer.

Habit #4 - Praying like everyone else.

I love hearing about how other people pray. Call me a dork if you want, but it truly is so interesting to me to hear from others about their prayer time, what they study, and how they talk with God.

At the same time, though, I can often fall into the comparison trap. I think to myself, “That’s a great idea, I should pray like that!” or “That person must have such a better relationship with God than I do, because they pray like that.” or even “I must be a bad Christian because I don’t talk to God the way they do.”

This mindset has actually led me to try a lot of different things in my prayer and quiet time with God, things I probably wouldn’t have normally tried except I was convinced that doing them made me a better follower of Jesus. And rather than focus on the methods of prayer that fostered a deeper connection with God, I struggled my way through these other ways of praying, and that usually just left me frustrated and feeling distant from Him.

Can you relate? Do you try to pray the way you think you “should” or the way others have told you works for them, only to find that your prayer time feels boring, awkward, or unenjoyable?

New Habit to Form

If I can be honest with you, I don’t really care how you pray. But it breaks my heart when I think of you praying the way you think you should or the way you think God expects you to, especially when it may not be helping you connect with Him.

It’s one thing to try a new way of praying because someone suggested it or you’re wondering if it might help you go deeper with God. It’s another thing to stick with a method of prayer that just. doesn’t. work for you, all because it’s how someone else does it or told you to do it.

Because at the end of the day, how you pray and what you pray matter far less than why you pray and that you pray. God just wants to connect with you, and He can meet with you through the words on your lips, the pages of your journal, or the music in your car. He’s creative, and He’s embedded His creativity into each one of us to give us a unique way of existing and being in relationship with Him.

What if we let go of the way we think we should pray, let go of looking to others to determine what our relationship with God should look like? What if we sang, journaled, danced, whispered, painted, walked along a trail, sat in our closets, laid in the grass in the backyard as we prayed, not because we thought that’s what we had to do, but because that’s what makes us feel fully alive in our Savior’s presence? How much better would our time with Jesus be if we embraced the creativity and personality He’s given us, and let that shine through our conversations with Him?

My friend, it gives me goosebumps just thinking about it.

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Published in the 016 - November 10 issue of TuesdayTribe

Written by Hannah Hladek

Photo by Courtney Kammers on Unsplash