Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all of God’s holy people. Ephesians  6:18 NLT

I grew up in a house where the blessing was said before every meal. It was my Daddy's blessing; sort of a one-breath, every word running together blessing that went like this; "Lord-thank-you-for-these-and-all-blessings-Christ's-sake-Amen." We never ever started eating until that blessing was said. Occasionally my mother might say, “I don’t think we blessed the food,” as she suddenly put down her fork and looked around the table at us. I learned, even if I insisted that we had – we would all bow our heads and it would be blessed again.

Jeff and I started attending church again when our kids were around four and seven. I wanted my kids to have that same attitude of thankfulness that had been taught to me as a child, so we renewed the blessing of the food at supper time. Our blessing consisted of the ‘God is great, God is good’ rote prayer. But we added that everyone would say aloud one thing they were thankful for that day before we said ‘Amen’. We learned some interesting things that happened at school through those daily prayers. I’ll just leave it at that.

Praying out loud with others is a scary thing for most people. I led a bible study for many years and one of the things we taught our leaders was that you said a short opening prayer but you never, ever, under any circumstances asked someone to pray out loud. It was a sure-fire way for them to run screaming out the door and never come back.

God gently and gradually changed my comfort with this out-loud prayer idea early on during my dive deeper into the Christian world. The first thing He did was introduce me to a ‘Moms In Touch’ group which met in my neighbor’s home on Tuesday mornings. From 9:00 until 10:00 we sat in her living room and a revolving gathering of mothers prayed for their children and the schools where their kids attended. Out loud. With each other. We started with prayers of Adoration, on to prayers of silent Confession, and then back to out-loud prayers of Thanksgiving and Supplication. It was profound. 

I learned what the heart of a godly mother looked like. We watched over the years as God answered prayers and changed lives. I learned that I could just open my mouth and pour out my thoughts. I didn’t have to say fancy prayers and use formal words. God just wanted to hear what was on our hearts and bumbling around in our brains. There was enormous comfort in hearing the prayers of other inadequate mothers who came to God empty-handed. 

And then there was the book by Stormy Omartian, The Power of a Praying Wife. One of my friends was going through a rough time in her marriage, so three of us decided to read that book together. On Friday mornings before work, we would meet in a locally owned coffee shop to discuss one chapter at a time, and then bow our heads (in a public place!) and pray for our husbands. Again, out loud. Yes, it felt a little scary and awkward. What would people think? But we just closed our eyes and did it.

Not too long after that, my husband and I decided to start praying together for our kids. Raising teenagers is hard and we were pretty sure we didn’t know what we were doing and could use some help that was bigger and wiser than we were. Stormy had just the book for us and we started praying through The Power of A Praying Parent. It was the first time Jeff and I had prayed together. I can’t remember what the statistics are, but they are incredibly high for couples who pray together to stay together. Again – it feels awkward and strange in the beginning. But just hold hands and do it. It’s a whole different level of intimacy.

Where am I going with all of this? Over the years I have learned to be comfortable praying with family and friends. It opens those polite surface relationships to something much deeper and intimate. There’s that word again. Intimate.

Yesterday I met a new friend. God is doing this with me this year – I am meeting people for coffee or lunch who have been introduced by a mutual friend. Yesterday this new friend started our 4-minute-old relationship with a blessing over our lunch and our time together. And then we both proceeded to pour out our lives into each other over soup and fresh-baked bread. And before walking away two hours later, we pushed aside our plates, held hands across the table and poured out our hearts together in prayer to our Father. 

God does this fascinating thing of allowing His Spirit to live within us. And when two of us gather together, Spirit recognizes Spirit, and immediately connects in a way that is above and beyond and deeper than any way mere humans can connect. It is beautiful. It is profound.

Prayer. If that word sounds a little scary to you, I completely understand. Start where you are. Start small. Open your eyes in the morning and before you rise, just go ahead and say these little words, “Thank you, God, for this day.” Look at you. You have just started a conversation with the Creator of the Universe. He is going to show you amazing things.

Question: What does prayer look like? The followers of Jesus had that same question. This is what he taught them: 

9 Pray like this: Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy.
10 May your Kingdom come soon.
May your will be done on earth,    as it is in heaven.
11 Give us today the food we need, 
12 and forgive us our sins,    as we have forgiven those who sin against us.
13 And don’t let us yield to temptation,     but rescue us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.  Matthew 6:9-13.

New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.