Prayer is not a practice that comes naturally. It didn’t for Jesus’ disciples, so why should we expect it to be so for us?

I’ve only been married for a little over a year, but one thing I’ve learned is that communication is going to be a lifelong learning process. I wasn’t born an expert at it and neither was my wife. We are constantly learning more about how to express ourselves fully to one another. One helpful tool for developing relational intimacy in marriage is learning to ask good questions in all areas of life. We did some of this when we went through premarital counseling, and it’s helpful to come back to those questions to make sure we are continuing to get to know each other more and more all the time. These questions don’t dry up our relationship, but instead, they breathe life into often ignored or forgotten areas of our relationship.

The same holds true for our conversations with God i.e. prayer. Reminders and guides aren’t meant to make our prayers rote, but instead, they have the potential to expand our knowledge of and relationship with God. And this expansion won’t happen naturally. We must learn and cultivate it.

This is why Jesus’ disciples asked him to teach them to pray, and as a result, Jesus provided us with the ultimate pattern for prayer and growing our conversations with God:

Father, hallowed be your name. Your Kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation.

-Luke 11:2-4

Jesus isn’t simply giving us the exact words we should pray over and over again. Rather, Jesus is giving us a pattern. He is providing a guide to remind us to address every aspect of our relationship with God in prayer. He points to at least three different aspects of prayer in this passage:

1. Adoration – “Father, hallowed be your name.” This phrase is an acknowledgement and praise of God’s holiness.
2. Confession – “Forgive us our sins.” This phrase is a moment of authenticity before God and a turning toward Him.
3. Reliance & Request – “Give us each day our daily bread… And lead us not into temptation.” These two phrases highlight our deep reliance upon God and the humble requests for physical and spiritual provision from him.

Don’t expect to grow in your relationship with God apart from developing a holistic rhythm of communication with God. Commit to involving at least these three aspects in your prayer on a daily basis.

Let’s devote ourselves to prayer by modeling our communication on Jesus’ guide for prayer.