Is Your View of God Hindering Your Prayer Life?
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I hear it way to often. Excuse after excuse as to why people don’t pray more. I even use them myself from time to time…”Not enough time”…”I don’t know what to pray”…”I don’t see answers to my prayers”… “The things I pray for aren’t important enough”…You can add your own excuses here as well. Are these the real reasons that we don’t pray the way we should or as often as we should? Or is there something deeper that we need to examine?
If you truly want to have an effective prayer life you need to look at the way in which you view God. I truly believe that the way in which we think about God, and our perception of Him, affects the way in which we pray to Him. If we believe that He is the God of mercy and grace…if He is the God who sent His only son to take our sins, our prayers should reflect that. If we believe that God doesn’t hear our prayers or answer them, then, of course, we will make excuses not to pray. So we see that having an effective and powerful prayer life has to start with our view of God.
Probably the greatest misconception of God and the greatest reason our prayer life may be so ineffective is that we believe we only need to come to Him in prayer when we want to ask Him for something. We basically reduce God to someone like Santa Claus. All He is there for is to fulfill our list of requests. This is not to say that we can’t go before Him with our requests and petitions but too often this is the only time we spend with God in prayer. Then, also, when we don’t get what we want, we get angry or frustrated and say to ourselves, “What’s the point in praying if God isn’t going to answer my prayers?”
There is so much to God that we miss out on when we pray like this. If you truly want to know who God is then you have to get to know Him not by asking for things but learning about who He is. This is the God who took nothing and created the whole universe. This is the same God who took the time to make each and every one of us special and unique.
We need to be able to see the majesty of God as the creator of the universe and of everything in it. When we begin to see the awesomeness of God, we begin to put into perspective our life in relation to that awesomeness. We are no longer alone and hopeless but instead, we are free and joyful because of who He is.
I guarantee you that if you pray with your whole heart and try to see God for who he is instead of what He can give you; He will change your heart. You will begin to see God in a whole new way. You will see God not as a wish granter but, instead, a joy giver. Then you will see your prayer life soar. Not because of your prayers but because of the one you are praying to.