By Allen White
And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they
love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by
others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you
pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.
Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. Matthew 6:5-6
There are prayers than inspire and prayers that tire. A man in my
home church was known for long-winded prayers. He was of good character, and
I’m sure he meant well, but his prayers over the offering could have easily
replaced the sermon.
My sister and I often joked that if we ever invited their family
over for dinner, we should get him started with the prayer as my mom started
cooking the meal. If we were lucky, the amen would coincide with “Dinner’s
ready.” But there really was no guarantee.
Jesus wasn’t as interested in the “what” as much as He was
concerned about the “why.” The issue was not the length of anyone’s prayers.
The issue wasn’t even praying in public. The issue was the heart of the person
praying. Why did he need to pray for the attention? What about lengthy prayers
caused her to feel better about herself?
Some people don’t like to pray publicly at all. They would
never volunteer in their small group or at a family gathering. Does this verse
let them off of the hook? Absolutely not.
The point that Jesus is making here is that our public
spiritual life should be an extension of our private spiritual life. In fact,
if there is an imbalance, then there should be more private prayer that no one
knows about than public prayer.
Prayer and pride simply don’t mix. Think about it. Prayer is
communication with the One who knows everything about you. Pride is building a
false self that is better than who you actually are. Who are you fooling?
Pride takes two different directions in prayer. Some think
they’re so eloquent, they just know that people will be so blessed and inspired
by their prayer that even the angels have paused to listen in Others don’t know
how to put the words together to create a prayer worth listening to. They would
rather avoid the embarrassment and not pray in public. Shy or bold, both come
from pride.
Prayer is simply talking to God. As long as you’re honest,
you can’t mess it up. If you’re worried about saying the wrong thing to God,
just look at the prayers of King David or Job. They prove that you can say
anything to God and get away with it.
When a request is made for prayer, do you always volunteer?
Do you never volunteer? Or, are you in the middle of the pack?
If you’re always jumping in, count to 10 and give someone
else a chance. Focus on private prayer.
If you never volunteer, then start with private prayer. Talk
to God out loud. The more you pray in private, the more meaningful your public
prayers will become.
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