Prayer: Responding to Jesus With Prayer
How do we respond to the risen Jesus? The book of Hebrews tells us: Since Jesus has risen into heaven as our great high priest, then we can have confidence to enter God’s presence, and because of that, we should enter his presence (Hebrews 10:19-22).
Since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess…. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. (Hebrews 4:14-16).
In other words, since Jesus has risen from the dead, we should pray, and we should do it with confidence. The risen Jesus makes a difference in our lives through prayer. Because he is now in heaven, we are guaranteed that our prayers will be heard. We pray “in Jesus’ name” – he intercedes for us – he prays for us! God listens to us just as well as he listens to Jesus himself.
There are many misconceptions about prayer. Let’s discuss what prayer is, and how we pray.
Prayer: asking for help
We are commanded to pray. We should pray even when we don’t feel like it, and even if we don’t understand the purpose. But God is not giving us duties just to add burdens to our life. He gives us commands for our own good. We need to pray. We need to admit that we are not self-sufficient, and we need God. We need him not just to supply physical things, but we need him for spiritual life and learning.
Scripture everywhere assumes that God’s people pray. We are not told to pray for specific lengths of time, but all the time (1 Thessalonians 5:17; Ephesians 6:18). We are not told to kneel or stand or lie on the floor when we pray. Rather, we are told to pray while doing everything (Philippians 4:6).
Prayer is a request. The most common Hebrew and Greek words for prayer mean “ask.” Whenever we ask God for anything, we are praying. Paul told the Philippians to ask for what they wanted (Philippians 4:6).
We are to ask God for the things we need. The better we know ourselves, the more we will know that we need help. Of ourselves, we can do nothing. If we want to accomplish anything worthwhile, we must have God’s help. We depend on him. Prayer is a cry for help. And since our needs never end, we should never stop praying.
Rely on God
Self-reliance is sin. It is arrogant for us tiny creatures to think that we can do whatever we want, that we can control our own destinies, that we can decide for ourselves what is right and wrong. The universe exists only because Christ is upholding it by the word of his power (Hebrews 1:3). We exist only because our Creator supplies our needs (Acts 14:17).
Yet even believers sometimes forget about our minute-by-minute need for God, and we may go through the day with scarcely a thought, scarcely a thanks for what God is doing for us. He is upholding us even when we ignore him.
Even when we face problems, we sometimes struggle on and on, trying to solve the problems with our own strength and strategies, instead of realizing that needs and desires should be shared with God (Philippians 4:6). We act as if everything depends on us, when everything actually depends on God. He knows our needs, and he wants us to trust him.
Thankfully, the Holy Spirit intercedes for us, even when we aren’t thinking about our needs (Romans 8:26-27). The Holy Spirit stands in the gap and helps us in ways that we do not know. When we fail to pray, the Holy Spirit steps in. Even so, we cannot turn all prayer over to the Holy Spirit while we go through life unawares.
We need to pray. We will be happier, less stressed, more fulfilled, if we keep in mind that we live in the presence of God, that in him we live and move and have our being (Acts 17:28). The more we are aware of God, the better we will understand our life, for God is the frame of reference that we need. When we see life in his context, we see it accurately.
God does not give us everything we want. That is because we often do not understand what we really need. We may pray for escape from a trial, but God is using that trial to teach us something far more important than temporary comfort. We may pray for a neighbor to come to Christ, but God knows this may not be the right time. God may want us to be more involved in the person’s life.
There are so many things wrong with this world that we should have many desires for ourselves, for our churches and for this world. We have much to pray about.
In prayer, we admit that we cannot handle everything on our own. In prayer, we are aware of a relationship between God and us, a relationship in which God has promised to provide our needs and to bless us in ways he knows are best. Prayer is an act of worship, for it acknowledges that God has power and that he is dependable.
Giving thanks
God gives us what we need, and it is right for us to thank him. Every breath we take is a gift from him. All the beauty in nature is a gift from him. The wonderful variety of sights, sounds, smells and textures is a gift from him. Every joy in life is a gift. Our talks with God should include thanks as well as requests. This is a form of praise, to acknowledge that he is the giver of every good thing.
As we thank God, we remind ourselves of our place in the universe—a place of great honor as a target of God’s affection, and a place of dependence on his graciousness. Giving thanks is a way to know who we are and why we exist; it reminds us that the universe works only through his goodness.
Some may say: “I already know that. Why do I have to keep saying it?” It is only through saying it that we are really mindful of it; it is too easy for us to go through the day without really being aware that life works best if we remember it is a gift. This is supported by the biblical commands to continually give thanks to God in our prayers (1 Thessalonians 5:17-18).
The Bible tells us to pray with persistence, giving the same request again and again. We know that God heard us the first time, and he knows how serious we are, so we must conclude that his command for persistence is for our own good. We need to tell ourselves again and again what the desires of our heart are, and that we trust God with them.
This does not mean that prayer is just a way to talk to ourselves, or of reminding ourselves of certain truths. No, Scripture assures us that prayer is a genuine communication with God. Our requests really go to heaven, and are really heard and answered by God. Our thanks really go to God; we must see him in the picture. Often, it is in prayer that God speaks to us, when we grow in our understanding of what he wants us to think or do.
We have never-ending thanks for what God does for us day to day, thanks for the promises he has made for our future, and thanks for what he has already done in Christ to ensure that future. Our thankfulness for Jesus Christ turns naturally to being willing to do what God wants us to do. We want to respond with love and loyalty to the God who loves us so much.
Our life, our joy, our pleasures, our sanity, are all dependent on God’s day-to-day favor toward us through Jesus Christ. We have much to be thankful for—everything we have and ever hope to have is a gift.
Our thanks should include our appreciation for who God is, and here our prayers blend thanks and praise. We praise his power, his wisdom, his mercy, and the beauty of his love. We praise him for who he is, not just for what he gives us, for he gives us himself. We love and adore him because he is so good.
Paul asked people to pray for him and his work. We also should pray for our churches, our leaders, and the work we are doing together. It takes God’s help for a congregation to make a difference for the kingdom in the world around us. Those who lead worship music need God’s blessing. Those who speak should speak the words of God (1 Peter 4:11), and this cannot be done from human wisdom. We all need to grow closer to God and to what he wants, and prayer is one of the ways that we grow.
Author: Joseph Tkach, updated 2025
