Value #3 -- Prayer

3.  We believe prayer is essential to the Christian life.

The Bible tells us prayer is necessary and effective.  God works through prayer.  When we pray, we receive God's help and wisdom and are also reminded of our need for God.

Even for people who have been believers for a long time, prayer can be a great mystery.  For some, the question is; if God already knows what's going to happen, why pray?  For others it's; why would God listen to me?  Does He need my advice?

The truth is, there are some things about prayer that will always be a mystery on this side of heaven, but no more of a mystery than why God would care about any of us in our sinful state.  We should all be constantly in awe that the God who created the whole universe, knows everything about us and still loves us.  When we can grasp that, we can grasp prayer.

First, we pray because we believe God answers prayer.  Now I don't think we can say God always gives us what we want.  Sometimes He does, but sometimes our prayers are too small or too short-sighted or wrong-headed.  Even in those cases, sometimes He gives us our way.  But other times He'll do what's best, not what we want.  James 5:16 tells us "the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective."

Second, we pray because prayer changes us.  When we make it a habit to turn to God for wisdom and guidance and help in trouble, we teach ourselves (or God teaches us) that we're not alone.  In fact, scientists are beginning to study the brains of people who spend a great amount of time in prayer.  What they're finding is that there is a certain part of the brain that engages prayer and is enlarged in people who pray--like they're exercising their prayer muscle.  Not only this, but studies also show that praying people are less stressed than those who do not pray.

Third, we prayer because it connects us with God.  The second and third points here are certainly related, but this one is worth mentioning on its own.  We believe that not only can we talk to God through prayer, but God also speaks to us.  It's like radio waves.  Radio waves are all around us, but we can only hear the talk or music if we tune in to the right frequency.  The story of Elijah tells us that God speaks in a gentle whisper.  We can become so busy with life that we aren't able to hear the whispers of the Spirit in our lives.  When we take the time to slow down and listen for God, we learn to recognize when He is speaking to us in the everyday.

All of the ministries of our church are "bathed" in prayer because we recognize that we don't do any work that God hasn't already begun.  Our job is then to learn to join Him in what He's already doing.