We don’t have to play games with God. He is our loving Heavenly Father. We don’t have to use many words in our prayers when we ask God for something. This is what Jesus says about prayer:
“And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.” (Jesus in Matthew 6:7; NIV)
“Pagans” are people who do not know God and His nature. In this sense, unfortunately, many “Christians” are pagans.
- Jesus on the cross made the difference. The devil rejoices over every “Lord’s Prayer” prayed
- Should we pray to angels? No
A living relationship with our Heavenly Father
So that nothing is misunderstood: we should talk to God a lot. He is our Father. He knows everything. He can do anything. We would be stupid if we did not have a great, living relationship with the almighty Almighty because we can and should receive from Him everything that is good for us. But we don’t have to babble on (oftentimes meaningless) to force God to answer our prayer. It’s about expanding our personal relationship with God.
In James, we read of Elijah, who prayed earnestly so that it would not rain for 3.5 years (James 5:17). Wow, we think, that must have been a long prayer; he must have pulled out all the stops; He must have gotten God with many, many words. But is that the case? No.
Let’s look at the powerful, intense prayer of Elijah that showed such results. It went like this: “Now Elijah the Tishbite, from Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, ‘As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.'” (1 Kings 17:1; NIV)
Let us pray and believe that God always helps us in the best way.
