Suck at praying?
You don’t have to suck at praying. We’re following the teaching of Jesus to learn how!

Suck at Praying? Part IV.

Cultivate an Attitude of Gratitude

If you suck at praying, chances are, you just don’t know HOW to pray.  In the following scripture Christ lines out a perfect path to take while praying. I plan on breaking it down into 5 parts, beginning now with the first and most important component. 

Jesus instructed his disciples to pray like this…

9 Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. 10 Your kingdom come, your will be done,on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us this day our daily bread, 12 and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil. (Matthew 6:9-13 ESV)

The first step to developing a prayer life that is active & powerful, (that doesn’t suck) is to Cultivate an Attitude of Gratitude!

While teaching his crew to pray, Jesus began by putting all attention back on God. 

9 Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. 

Hallowed simply means, “Holy” or “Most Holy.”

Jesus is instructing us to begin our prayers with recognition for who God is and how Holy he is. One of the best ways to show recognition is to communicate gratitude. In other words, a great way to begin any prayer is to start by Thanking God for all the blessings in your life. So often the only reason we pray is because we are walking through a tough season and we need God to DO something. Rarely to we pray just to THANK HIM. 

Try it, pray for 5min but make it only about how grateful you are for the blessings you have now. If you don’t know where to start, try thanking him that you are physically able to read this right now. Then let your imagination run wild.  

Cultivate an Attitude of Gratitude and watch, prayer will become something you love to do. 

Have you ever felt like you suck at Praying? I have and unfortunately most people feel the same.

However, an awesome truth is, you don’t have to.

Your prayers don’t have to suck!

Is it possible that your prayers suck because you DON’T know how to pray?

Christ lined out a beautiful path for us to follow when we pray.

Prayer is, after all, the number one way to communicate with God, and he wants open, fluid, and constant communication.

Over the next few days, we’ll walk through the path laid out in Matthew 6:9-13. A path that has been taught for years, and that I still follow to this day!

But first, tell me about you?

1. What have you found successful in your prayer life, juxtaposed what has been detrimental?
2. When you pray, do you feel like God is listening?
3. What has been the most powerful time in your life  with regards to prayer?

I want to know your thoughts. Click the Pencil icon above to reply.

or 

Email carey@theocmovement.com

Some may call it an obsession, I call it a healthy appreciation for culinary genius! (Taken with instagram)