Could I pray literally every minute of every day, would it completely consume my thoughts and actions to the point where I can't interact with the world as I used to without prayer running through my noggin? I know we can't text and drive anymore but prayers and driving might get a little hard for me to do.
The point is: prayer changes us. It is an open pathway for God to talk with us and we should be impassioned by the idea of being in God's presence constantly.
Today at church, our pastor talked about Acts 12 when Peter was captured by the Romans and there are many things they do right in these passages that allude to how we should pray.
Firstly, they are praying together. The people of Peter's church have seen a need and they understood that together they could accomplish more and be more in tune with God's Spirit.
Next, it says they were praying in earnest. And this is described as with a passionate longing. If we could seek God in earnest through our prayers as opposed to the sometimes mindless jargon we throw around, I believe we would see a substantial difference! I know personally, when I am decided upon to pray before a meal, I can easily spit out 10 seconds of babble that isn't meaningful or from the heart (taking it any longer than 10 seconds starts taking away from meal time (especially if you're leaned over your hot delicious food and your mouth has started watering)). We should take our time with God SO seriously. Imagine Him looking over you as you are praying, because He is in your presence as you pray.
Finally, they don't pray for Peter out of perfect faith. What?? In verse 15 the party of believers says to the woman who answered the door, "'You're out of your mind,' they told her. When she kept insisting that it was so, they said, "It must be his angel.'" Keep in mind that they were praying the entire time that this exact thing happen to Peter that they were now questioning directly. This is so huge because we don't pray perfectly as we are imperfect beings, but God and His plan is perfect for us.
Therefore, our faith doesn't have to be perfect because our God is.
In our failures, He is absolute. In our iniquities, He is light. In our doubting that what we need has been provided, He comes through anyways. Needless to say, they finally went to the door and saw Peter standing there.
Our prayers don't have to be perfect, but they have to be there if we want God to help us. Today, let's be transformed by the renewal of our minds. Let's pray continually and find more reasons to be in the presence of the Almighty God.
HE is our refuge and none can keep us from that.
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