Bible Reading: Matthew 6:5-13
Have you ever gotten fidgety waiting for someone to finish a
r-e-a-l-l-y long prayer? Do you worry that maybe God doesn’t hear your prayers because
they’re short or don’t use “prayer words” like, “thee,” “thou,” or “I pray”?
Relax. God never said that our prayers had to be long, or that we had to use special words in them. In fact, Jesus said that we should keep our prayers short and sweet saying in Matthew 6:7, “And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.”
Jesus also reminded us that God already knows what we need so we don’t need to spend a lot of time describing the situation or repeat the problem over and over. Since God created us He understands just how we feel and He’s the one who created our language, so we don’t need to use special words when we pray.
All we need to do when we pray is to come to God sincerely seeking His help and wanting to talk with Him. He’ll listen no matter what words we use or how many or how few of them we speak. Simply said, it's OK to keep your prayers short and sweet.
“…your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” Matthew 6:8b
Prayer: Heavenly Father, thanks for making talking to You so easy. In Jesus’ name. Amen