A Person to Pray With
I hope with all my heart that this week's devotions have encouraged you to pray! CE Cornell wrote this: "Prayer has been called the Golden Key to unlock the Treasure House of God. Prayer is said to be the heart-cry of the child to the Father's love for its needs." True words indeed, and so we've discussed at length some practical help for praying, this week.
Let's close this series by considering finding a person to pray with. Jesus prayed alone, often, and I think we are all meant to do that - and it is this type of prayer that we have discussed this week: just you and God. But Jesus also took people with Him to prayer sessions at times.
Jesus' Example of Praying With Others
In Matthew 26:37-38 we read of Him going to Gethsemane to pray, and taking His three close friends with Him - Peter, John and James. In Acts 20, we see Paul kneeling down and praying with people. Perhaps, if we are to more like Jesus (or even more like Paul), we should spend more time praying with others.
Do you have people in your life you pray with? Maybe it's time to find some. If you are married, your spouse is the obvious first choice. As they say, the couple that prays together stays together! Get into the habit of praying with your spouse out loud - both of you taking turns to do it. Most mornings after Shereen and I read the Bible, I pray. On Sundays she prays for me before I head to church. Those are precious, precious moments!
Finding Your Prayer Partners
If you get involved with a small group or Bible study, perhaps you can get used to praying out loud there. It might be that you write out your prayers the first while, to help you. But cultivate a habit of praying out loud with others. It's a great thing to do.
But I think that it may be more important to have a prayer partner of sorts, who you perhaps don't even pray with out loud, but who covers you in prayer and who you cover in prayer. I have a small number of people that I will message or call and say "please, pray for me about this", or "please cover me with prayer as I go here", and so on. I also provide the same prayer cover for a number of people. Those prayer partnerships are really worth having.
Friends, be a pray-er this year! Make it a priority. Find your place and your preferred posture. Try some different patterns and figure out what works. Partner with others. Then, simply, pray. Don't just talk about prayer or read about prayer or listen to messages about prayer or read stories of great prayerful people. Pray! May it be that 2026 is the year that you truly became a prayerful person yourself, so that one day when you meet God face-to-face, you won't have to regret hours you didn't pray.
Praying with others strengthens both your faith and theirs - find a prayer partner this week who will cover you in prayer as you cover them.