No matter how long I teach on prayer, I don’t think I’ll ever plumb the depths of the teaching of Jesus on prayer through what we call The Lord’s Prayer. In its simplicity it is packed with practical guidance for effective prayer. I believe that the focus of this prayer is the heart of Jesus’ other teaching as well…the Kingdom. Jesus’ lifestyle and teaching focused on the Kingdom of God. So it shouldn’t surprise us that when he teaches on prayer, he points us to pray about the Kingdom.

“Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” Those simple, familiar words should both motivate and populate our prayers. As I hear those words I am motivated to pray for the advance and eventual triumph of the Kingdom of God over all other pretenders. I know I will someday see Jesus crowned as King of kings and Lord of lords, and I want to see Him acknowledged as such in the here and now of everyday life. I long to see all of creation begin to understand what it means for Jesus to be Lord.

As Kingdom praying begins to dominate my daily prayer life, I find that I have shifted from the “gimme” prayers that used to be pervasive, to a deeper desire for what pleases the Lord. The prayers seem to be “bigger” and less selfish. Even if the prayers deal with my own needs, they are now couched in yearnings that deal with Kingdom values.

Perhaps a good place to begin is to ask the Lord what is happening in heaven that He wants to see occur on earth. That is, after all, the way he phrased this prayer for us. From Scripture it appears that heaven is most of all, a place that is overwhelmed by an awareness of the Presence of God. The continual worship seen in heaven is the natural response to the Presence of God. Praying for an increased awareness of His Presence brings heaven to earth and can result in an amazing revival for the Church!

I had just finished preaching on prayer and was approached by a Sunday school teacher from the congregation. She had a great story for me. Knowing that it was a weekend focused on prayer for their church, she had taught her group of 6-year-olds about prayer that morning. When she finished, she invited them to come pray at a little altar she had set up.

She was listening to them pray when she was surprised to hear one little boy reciting the alphabet. The boy next to him leaned over and asked him why he was saying his abc’s. The first little boy answered, “I don’t really know what to say, so I thought I’d just give God the letters and let Him make up the words.”

It’s a cute story, but more I thought about, the more profound it became. Lots of times I find myself in prayer situations like that little boy, just not knowing how I should pray. To be honest, I’ve never been quite so clever as the child who recited the alphabet, but I believe he was on to something good and biblical. Romans 8:26 tells us that when we don’t know how to pray, the Holy Spirit helps us. We don’t always need to have the right words. We don’t really even have to give God the alphabet. As we bring situations before the Lord who knows our hearts and the situation better than we do, we can have confidence in the Lord who promises to hear our prayers even before we call out.

That assurance gives me peace as I pray. I don’t have to always have the right words. I don’t even have to ask the right things. I just want to have the Lord step in and do what He desires and what brings Him glory and advances His kingdom. After all, when I pray, it’s ultimately up to Him as to how and when He answers my prayer.

Read other articles on revival from Dave. “A Biblical Model for Revival Praying” is one of his most popular.

I believe that one of the most powerful, transformative prayers that can be prayed in any circumstance, is the heart of the Model Prayer: ” Your Kingdom Come, Your will be done.”  As I was praying this one day over a particular situation, I sensed from The Lord that this was an invitation for an invasion. An invasion of the Kingdom of God into the kingdom of my own little world.

We all have a strong tendency to serve as rulers over our own kingdoms. We make our own rules and set up our own boundaries. Of course, our little kingdoms are a wreck. The problem is bad leadership…and yes…we are each the incompetent leaders of our individual kingdoms. Sometimes the best thing that can happen is a benevolent invasion.

Years ago I was visiting in the totalitarian nation of Myanmar, formerly known as Burma. In a fascinating conversation with a Burmese taxi driver, he said he wished that the United States would invade his country.  He said they would be much better off under our leadership.  Quite apart from the morality or rightness of such an invasion, it was a very revealing statement. This taxi driver saw the suffering of his people under bad rulers, and wished for a beneficent invasion.

Perhaps we need the clarity of that Burmese driver regarding our own personal kingdoms. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus told us we are blessed when we recognize that we are spiritually poor.  With the humble awareness that we are miserable rulers of our own kingdoms, perhaps we will begin to pray for a new ruler of a new kingdom. We will offer an invitation to an invasion as we pray in each and every situation of life, “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done.”

As our nation continues its moral spiral downward, a scripture that is increasingly referred to is Psalm 11:3:  “When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?” It is certainly a contemporary question. The problem comes when we try to supply our own answer to this important question. The answers can come fast and furious: vote this way, protest this action, write your congress person, boycott that group…and much more. All of those answers actually might be valid in small ways. The difficulty is that they are all insufficient and fail to address the answer found in scripture.

When we pick one verse, we often do so at the expense of the verses around it. That’s especially true in this case. The answer to the compelling question, “What can the righteous do?” is found in verse 4. “The Lord is in his holy temple; The Lord is on his heavenly throne. He observes everyone on earth; his eyes examine them.” The answer to the question is simple – Look up!  God is still in charge.

When seismic changes are taking place in culture, it looks as though everything is falling apart. Our nature is to jump in and try to fix it, or to retreat in despair and discouragement. The command of God’s Word though, is to look to The Lord. It’s time to pray. It’s time to draw near and realize that ultimately God is in charge and nothing is happening of which he is unaware. It doesn’t mean that we might not need other action in addition to prayer.  But after we have prayed, our actions will not be acts of desperation but that which emerges from the leadership of the Holy Spirit. God is still on His throne. And we are those who come boldly into His throne room to lay before him our requests for His will to be poured out on earth as it is in heaven. What can the righteous do? We can pray!

James gives us some very important teaching on prayer in James 5:13-18: 

 ^“Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.

Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.”

We are told that whatever we are facing…good or bad, we should pray. Good advice. The problem in the text is that the example given of a man of prayer is that of Elijah. However, Elijah, in our eyes, seems to be this amazing man of prayer.  How can we be like him?

James, inspired by God, says Elijah was a human being, just like us. He was simply a normal person with no special dispensation from God.

So let’s look at a summary of the obedience of Elijah’s prayer life:

•  I Kings 17:1: Rain did not fall in Israel for several years – “Now Elijah the Tishbite, from Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, ‘As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.’”
• I Kings 17:7-16: A widow and her son did not starve – “For the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry, in keeping with the word of the Lord spoken by Elijah” (v. 16).
• I Kings 17:17-24: The widow’s son was raised from the dead – “The Lord heard Elijah’s cry, and the boy’s life returned to him, and he lived” (v. 22).
• I Kings 18:16-40: Elijah called on the Lord and was victorious over the prophets of Baal on Mt Carmel – “Then you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord. The god who answers by fire – he is God” (v. 24).
• I Kings 18:41-46: Rain falls from heaven – “And Elijah said to Ahab, ‘Go, eat and drink, for there is the sound of a heavy rain’” (v. 41).

Elijah, because of his obedience, had an amazing response to his prayers. And Scripture says that Elijah was a person just like us? How can this be?

We can see the answer to this question when suddenly everything changes for Elijah in I Kings 19:

• He became fearful: “Elijah was afraid and ran for his life” (v. 3).
• He was depressed and discouraged: “…he came to a broom tree, sat down under it and prayed that he might die” (v. 4)
• Elijah, mistaken about what was going on, was filled with self-pity: “I am the only one left and now they are trying to kill me too” (v. 14).

We can all tend to be like this side of Elijah from time to time – fearful, wanting suffering to end, mistaken about what is happening, and filled with self-pity. We can do that!

Here’s my point. Elijah was a flawed man. He had great successes and some failures too. In spite of some amazing answers to prayer, his life was not easy. The purpose of prayer is not to make life easy.

As Elijah learned, when we commit to obeying God and serving Him in prayer, we become an integral part of the purposes of God on planet earth.  Elijah got in on some really good stuff, because he prayed.  And we can too!  As a matter of fact, I will tell you bluntly that God has made us for this.

To pray like Elijah means:

1.    Praying prayers that are focused on God’s purposes.

2.    Praying prayers that are filled with faith.

3.    Praying prayers that involve acts of obedience.

Our job is to pray as Elijah did…with focus, faith, and obedience so that God will receive glory. The final result always rests in God’s capable hands.