Jason Upton – Teach me how to pray

It is a subject matter that was brought up by a disciple rather than a subject in Jesus’ repertoire of disciple-making moments. Obviously Jesus knew that prayer was vital, He practiced it personally. I can only imagine the patience Jesus exercised in waiting for them to ask. He waited for them to be eager, to be motivated.

Jesus was an amazement to His disciples – life was one unending experience that they could never quite explain. They saw the power of darkness fall – sickness, death and despair. There were so many demonstrations of power. They saw the eyes, smiles and grateful expressions in the faces of those who were healed – the blind, sick, dumb, deaf – healed and set free able to go back to their families totally changed. Like me, they must have marvelled at His wisdom, especially when confronted. I think that when Jesus was eating, sleeping, teaching, traveling – and they were always watching – He was praying. Somehow there must have been a connection made that Jesus power had something to do with prayer.

How easy is it to ask one who has demonstrated their expertise to share it with others?

More so when you think that some of the disciples were already men of prayer. Some of them were disciples of John, and he taught them how to pray. However in watching Jesus they knew He had something they did not have. He made them aware how little they really knew about prayer.

I have been visiting churches, pastors and individuals lately who are being called to be disciple-makers and people of prayer. They cry out, “Lord, teach us to pray.” The brutal fact is that we do not know how to pray. If we are to pray and not to faint, there is more fainting going on then praying. So it is either life through the ministry of prayer or we drift off into discouragement and frustration of a feeble, powerless, useless and fruitless life marked by anxiety, fear, guilt and despair.

Now Jesus^[a] was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.” – Luke 11:1  ESV