Our Father. Week 1. Introduction

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1 Our Father Introduction Today marks the first day of the prayer devotion. Starting today (or tomorrow for those of you who are planners) you will begin a 40 day journey through prayer. Over the course of 6-weeks we will be combing through what biblical scholars call The Lord s Prayer. Now don t let this 5 verse prayer pass you by; the depth of this segment in scripture is unmatched and full of God s character and will. Prayer is something many Christians struggle with; can you relate. It s sometimes an odd thing to partake in, and you are worried, even during times of solitude, that you are saying the wrong words. While your fear of praying aloud in a group may not dissipate, we do hope that your confidence in the power of God through prayer is strengthened. A few quick things to note: it is designed to build off of itself; each day you will be challenged and the hope is that you keep building off of each challenge. While there will be some days where the challenge is designated as one-day only, please don t let that detour you if you feel like it is something you, personally, need to repeat; that s between you, God, and the Holy Spirit. Here is the disclaimer for this devotion: prayer is not limited. Throughout scripture we see many men and women pray to God, and if you pay attention, you will find that their circumstances, location, vocation, and even personal history are all different. Prayer is not exactly the same every single time, because the circumstances are always changing. It is also easy to view this devotional as a to-do list for prayer. This is an incorrect assessment, as we intent this prayer to be a model. The goal of this devotion is not to give you a list of things you must do it prayer or a step-by-step guideline on how to pray, but strategies that give you the opportunity to strengthen your walk with God by taking a new and fresh approach. This 40 day prayer journey has the potential to be used by God to mold, convict, stretch, and encourage you. The key is allowing Him to do so. So today, right now, we hope that you are on your knees asking God to make whatever changes He wants to make in your life. Most importantly, pray that He will open your eyes to things you may have previously been blinded to and give you the strength to keep pushing forward. For some, there may not be an immediate change in your prayer walk and you may struggle more than your friends, but I promise that if you remain diligent God will help you get there. For the next 40 days we challenge you to wake up and begin communing with God. Find a special place (i.e. a closet, the roof, etc) where you can go, away from everything in the world, and spend time with your Heavenly Father. Know that you are not alone. There is an entire family going taking the same steps with you and we are praying for you.

2 Day 1 Pray, then, in this way: Our Father, who is in Heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive our debts, as we also forgive our debtors. And do not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever. Amen. Matthew 6:9-13 (NASB) Open your eyes, roll out of bed, and grab a seat at the table. Maybe do a few of jumping jacks just to get your body away. Now, take a deep breath as we are starting off with a bang. This will be the one of the more challenging days of this 40 day prayer journey. Today, instead of verbally praying you will be challenged to write out your prayer or prayers, depending on how many times you pray a day. On the outside, this doesn t seem very challenging, but what I have found is when you write something down, it s very easy to either go back and add to it, or think about what you are going to say before you actually write it down. The tendency is to appear more educated and intelligent in your writing. Today, we don t want that; we want your raw prayer(s). We want you to be honest is writing down exactly what you pray; don t go back and make changes in hopes to make yourself sound or appear more spiritual, because if you do, you miss the point. Some words of encouragement: I have done this on multiple occasions. Normally, I do this when I m overloaded with something and I feel an innate urge to write a prayer to God begging for peace and encouragement. It s during those times where I m most honest and raw that God really opens my eyes and provides comfort. So, throughout the day, no matter how many times you pray or what you pray for, make a serious attempt to write them down, even if you only get one written. For some of you who prefer the use of modern technology, it may be easier for you to record yourself praying just don t delete it.

3 Day 2 And [Jesus] was saying, Abba! Father! Mark 14:36a (NASB) Did you survive yesterday s challenge? Its difficult being honest on paper, but we will revisit the prayer or prayers you wrote down yesterday throughout this devotion, including today. Review your prayer and find the first time you acknowledged God. It is most often that this is the first word you use. Write it down here: You ve probably heard people open in prayer by using Dear : Heavenly Father, God, Most High God, Jesus, etc. What you don t hear very often is someone using the words Dad or Daddy. Ponder that for a minute. At first glance, some of you probably find it odd to use those terms in association with God. Hearing someone call God daddy is a strange thing to hear much less say. Yet, at the same time, it implies a very close relationship between two people. Some of you may struggle with this challenge because you have a negative outlook on your father. For you, it s hitting way to close home; to something really personal and hurtful. Let me encourage you to stay the course. If you find it completely overbearing simply ask God to begin working in your life and allow you to view Him as Dad. We know from Scripture that God greatly desires to have a personal relationship with us. He is the ultimate Father; He wishes to provide for us, protect us, and love us. When we take the time to pray, we should be personal with our Heavenly Dad. Your challenge today is to call God Dad or Daddy during your prayer time today. I also implore you to continue using this title throughout the duration of this devotion.

4 Day 3 Here s what I want you to do; find a quiet, secluded place so you won t be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. Matthew 6:6 (MSG) Glance back at the prayer(s) you wrote on Day 1. Do you remember where you were when you wrote this prayer? If yes, go ahead and write it in the space below: We live in a society where we like to multitask and do things on the fly. There is a serious lack of intentionality when it comes to our lives, especially spiritual. This includes prayer. It is common for us to pray a simple 10-second prayer normally as we are running to get to the next thing on our daily agenda. I would argue that we rarely take time to pull away from everything and spend time talking to God. Please don t misunderstand; sometimes those 10-second prayers are what get you through a certain situation, but understand that in order to know someone better, you need to spend quality time with them. Think about it this way: imagine having a conversation with someone (a spouse, significant other, friends, family members, etc) and they spend their time attached to their phone or computer, not making any notice that they are paying attention to the words coming out of your mouth. You are attempting to engage in conversation and yet, they are distracted. How does that feel? Brian mentioned that [God] wants a heart that says, I want to commune with you. In order to really commune with God, you need to pull away from any and all possible distractions and go to a place where you can be focused and intentionally talk to God. It means away from the distractions, away from the noise, and away from anything that has the remote possibility of pulling you away from God. Our goal is to help you learn how to have an intimate relationship with God, to go deeper with Him and connect with Him on a new level. So today, your challenge is to make 5 minutes to talk to God in a place where there are no distractions. If you remember, this is part of the initial challenge from the introduction. Know that this will be difficult for many of you; however, we believe that God awards our diligence and perseverance, and it s important to keep trudging up the mountain even on the days we feel like camping out.

5 Day 4 And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words Matthew 6:7 (NASB) Repetition and memorization. For college students, this is the key to passing tests. Read the information over and over again; memorize words and definitions, facts, and people. How many times, do those words and facts just become meaningless? Forget the intent of securing that information and meaning into your mind; rather, you just keep it memorized until the test is over and you walk out the door. The same concept is true of our walk with God. Prayers are found throughout scripture and it s easy to get into the habit of repeating a certain prayer during a certain time. However, how long does it take for those prayers, repeated over and over, to become meaningless? When do you stop paying attention to the purpose and meaning behind the words? For example, how many of you pray the exact same prayer every time you bless the food? There is no exact way to pray. Prayer is different for every person because no two people are living the exact same life nor struggling with the exact same hardships. Our prayers should be personal and unlimited, not confined to a small box where growth never happens. Allow your prayers to expand and avoid meaningless repetition.

6 Day 5 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God Philippians 4:6 (NIV) While we have covered a lot of very important aspects of a prayer life during this first week, today stands above the rest, because it is something that we will come back to over the next 5 weeks. It is also something that we struggle with on a daily basis: overcoming our shyness and being willing to talk about our deepest, darkest struggles. This is applicable note only within our circle of family and friends, but also with God. We like to be very vague in our prayer life and exclude the details. Why? It could be any number of reasons: embarrassment, the belief that God may be more inclined to answer our prayer if we are vaguer about the request, lacking faith that God will even answer our prayer at all, or fear of Him denying our request. Regardless, something is inhibiting you from being specific, and you know what it is. So today, be specific. If it helps you, look back at your prayer from Day 1, see if you asked God for something in a non-specific way, and, today, be specific about it. Know that your prayer life is bound to continue being molded throughout your Christian walk, however, if you do not get into the habit of presenting your specific requests to God, you will miss the opportunity to commune with Him in an unfathomable way