Investigating Prayer

Three weeks ago, I walked into the Wartburg wrestling room for the men’s team practice and their weekly “Foundations” post-practice Bible study. The team had just returned from Christmas break, so it was natural to ask most of the guys, “How was your break?” The usual answer was “Great!”

But one of the guys responded, “A little too good.” I wondered what that meant, so he explained: “I enjoyed Mom’s homemade cooking a little too much, and came back 25 pounds over weight, which I need to lose by Saturday.” In other words, he was confessing that the lack of wrestling practices and encouragement from teammates had caused him to make some undisciplined decisions concerning food over break.

Wrestling in Prayer

Two days ago, we finished up our 21 Days of Prayer & Fasting for the new year. If you participated, hopefully you experienced some benefits, like closeness to God, clearer priorities, sense of direction, renewed purpose, and/or something else.

But what happens to many of us after completing the 21 Days is we make the same mistake as my wrestler friend and become undisciplined. We slowly slip back into old patterns of ignoring Scripture, forgetting to pray, over-indulging in social media and unhealthy food, or other unhelpful habits. And when we return to these unhelpful patterns, it feels like everything God did during the 21 Days was for nothing.

So to help you “stay in shape” during these next few weeks (or to “try again” if you didn’t really stick with the 21 Days), I want to launch a new series here on the blog called Investigating Prayer. Through this series, we’ll use a journalist’s set of questions (Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How) to “interview” the Lord’s Prayer as taught by Jesus in Matthew 6:7-13. My hope is that this series will help your prayer life either stay vibrant or become vibrant.

So join me here next week as we kick off the series by looking at The Who of Prayer.