What is prayer? Simply put, it’s talking to God like you’re talking to a friend. Even though it can seem complicated and mysterious, it’s an invitation to bring your thoughts, worries, cares, confessions and confusion before the God of the universe with the assurance that He hears you and will answer you. So if prayer is a conversation with God, it leads us the question: how do we pray?
Although God is all-powerful and all-knowing He invites us to talk to Him. This is reassuring because it lets us know that anyone can learn how to pray and grow in prayer. This is because there isn’t a specific formula of words you must say or a ritual you must do beforehand. Prayer is open and accessible to anyone who is willing to call on the name of Jesus.
In this article, I’ll share my experience with prayer, share what the Bible says about prayer and show you how to pray step-by-step. If you’re excited to learn more about prayer and the benefits it can have for your life, keep reading!
My First Sincere Prayer as an Adult
What is prayer? This question can prompt an answer that’s as complex as it is mysterious, but still boil down to communication with God.
Prayer is a spiritual discipline in the Christian life. It’s the lifeblood to a relationship with God. Although even a childlike prayer can make it up to heaven, it can still feel intimidating and mysterious. As a result, it can be hard to understand how to pray and how it works.
Like most people, the first adult prayer I remember praying was born out of pain.
I had experienced a breakup of a relationship that spanned the 9 years of high school through to college into my early professional years.
When the breakup happened, I was devastated, mostly because of how the relationship ended.
As I sat in my bedroom sitting with the reality of this heart breaking news, without a single friend to share it with, I looked around the room and began to weep and pray.
What I learned that night is that God accepts prayers, even if they’re hardly understood by us. Somehow heaven can translate tears.
Prayer is a Conversation with God
I’ve mentioned how prayer is complex, but in the same way, it’s actually quite simple and that can be confusing to some people.
I lived in Lebanon for two and a half years. During that time, my book, Fish Food, was released and I was so eager to share it with people that I gave a copy of it to a friend who wasn’t a Christian.
After some time, I asked him for feedback on the book. And he said he was confused about how I spoke about God as someone we can have a personal relationship with. It was a confusing and mind-boggling concept for him.
If we can have a relationship with God, then it means that prayer is a way to connect with God. It means that prayer is a conversation with God. Prayer is the back and forth ebb and flow of the waves of the ocean. We speak and then we pause. God speaks and we listen.
What Types of Prayers Can I Pray?
There are as many type of prayers as there are situations in life and as there are people. We pray before we eat a meal, before we drive our cars or start a religious church service. We pray for comfort and strength, in celebration and for forgiveness. Each prayer is for a different purpose but God hears and honors all of them!
Many people categorize prayers, such as prayers of praise, confession, thanksgiving and requests. Some people advocate for spending set amount of time with each type of prayer.
Before you get bogged down with all of this information, just know that you can pray sincerely what’s on your heart to God and He will listen. Just like with anything, as you pray, you will continue to grow in prayer.
If you’d like a bit of structure, there is a prayer model that many people use to guide them during their prayer time called the ACTS Prayer Model. The letters in ACTS form the acronym Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving and Supplication (or Requests).
Prayer of Adoration (Praise)
Prayers of adoration are prayers of praise. They lift up God to His place as ruler of the universe. They help us understand that in the grand scheme of things He is sovereign, all-knowing and all-present. Praying prayers of adoration can give us assurance that God sees us, He knows us and He cares about it. It allows us to take our hands off the steering wheel and trust in Him.
Prayers of Confession
The next type of prayer is a prayer of confession.
Confession is when you come to God with your sins and ask for forgiveness. This may bring up a new topic that you hadn’t thought of before, which is sin.
Sin is defined as breaking God’s law or His 10 commandments, which can be found in Exodus 20. And beyond that, in Matthew 22:37-40 Jesus summarizes all the 10 commandments into two great commandments, saying, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
So, if we have broken any of these commandments, we are invited to confess our sins to God and to ask for forgiveness in the name of Jesus. These are called prayers of confession.
Prayers of Thanksgiving
The T in the ACTS Prayer Model stands for Thanksgiving. We can see that Jesus loves people who show gratitude after they receive blessings from Him when we observe His reaction in the story of the ten lepers being healed in Luke 17:11-19.
After Jesus healed them and told them to show themselves to the priest one of the ten lepers return to say thank you to Jesus. Jesus replies, “Didn’t I heal ten of you. Why did only one of you return to say thank you?”
Similarly with us, Jesus loves for us to not just storm heaven’s door with our requests but to also show gratitude for the things He has done and the things we have received from Him.
Prayers of Supplication (Request)
Finally, we have the S in the ACTS model, which is probably the prayer we’re most familiar with, which is supplication or asking for things.
There are many places in the Bible where we are invited to ask God for things, such as Matthew 7:9-11, which says, “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”
So, we are invited to ask God for our needs knowing that He hears and answers our prayers.
Avoid Formulaic Prayers
In thinking about the ACTS model when it comes to prayer, the most important thing to remember is to avoid formulaic prayers. Come naturally to God and share your heart with Him. It’s amazing to me that the God of the universe invites us to come and talk to Him as if we are talking to a friend. And when we talk to friends, we share life with them from our hearts, out of the abundance of what’s going on in our lives.
Why Prayer Matters
Speaking from personal experience, prayer is the foundation of my relationship with God. It allows me to engage in a back and forth conversation with God knowing that He listens, cares and engages with me.
Prayer provides comfort in times of stress and gives me assurance of God’s peace if I’m ever experiencing anxiety. Prayer releases me from the responsibility to get everything right in this life and allows me to transfer the responsibility to God.
God gives us this invitiation to release ourselves from the responsibility of our desires in Psalm 37:4 where it says, “Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.”
When you invite God into your situations, through prayer, He takes on the responsibility of worrying about your situation allow you to rest in Him.
This idea is futher supported by the verse in 1 Peter 5:7, which says, “Cast all your cares upon Him because He cares for you.”
The more experience you have with God, the more you will depend on Him. The more you depend on Him and observe Him coming through in your life, the more your faith will grow bigger and bigger. As your faith grows, you’ll learn to depend on Him more and more.
How to Pray to God (Step-by-Step)
Now, you may be wondering how to pray. In this section, I’ll answer some questions you might have about prayer and then we’ll bring it all together in a step-by-step guide.
Should I pray out loud or in my mind?
You may be wondering how to pray. Should you pray out loud, into the atmosphere or is it okay to pray in your mind. You can pray out loud or in your mind. God will hear you either way.
What should I talk about?
Simply be honest and approach God with humility. You can use the ACTS structure we discussed above or you can simply share what’s on your heart. The most important thing is to show up and pray.
What position should I be in when I pray?
When you pray to God, you can be in a quiet place in a prayer position – knees bent, eyes closed, hands folded, speaking quietly in your mind. God will hear your prayers.
Can I pray while I’m doing other things?
Fortunately for us, God also hears us when we’re sitting in our cars, as we’re cooking lunch and as we’re doing laundry.
Learning to Pray and Listen: Story of Hannah and Samuel
One of the most important parts about prayer is to remember it’s a back and forth exercise of speaking and listening.
If you think of the story of young Samuel and his mother Hannah, found in 1 Samuel, you have an example how God not only hears us when we pray but he also speaks to us.
Hannah had trouble getting pregnant. For years she tried and tried unsuccessfully and it was eating away at her. One day, she went to the temple to pour her heart out to God and plead with Him to allow her to have a child. While at the temple Eli, the high priest saw her lips moving but no sound coming out. Because she was so distraught and seemingly talking to herself, he thought she was drunk and rebuked her for coming into the temple in a drunken state.
Hannah replied to the priest that she wasn’t drunk she was just desperately pouring her heart out to God begging him to let her get pregnant. Once Eli understood her situation, her blessed her and told her God would answer her prayer. And sometime later, Hannah did indeed become pregnant! What an answer to prayer!
Hannah created a legacy for prayer in her family because Samuel, the son she had with her husband Elkanah, began his life rooted in prayer as well!
In Hannah’s desperation to have a child, she told God she would commit the boy back to God. After weaning young Samuel, she brought him to the temple, as was their yearly custom as a family, and left him with the high priest Eli to perform priestly duties. Hannah gave God back the boy she so desperately wanted.
As Samuel was resting one evening in the temple, he heard a voice call his name, “Samuel!” He jumped out of bed and ran to Eli, the high priest asking if he had called him. “No,” said Eli, “go back to bed.” As young Samuel went back to bed, again he heard the voice call out, “Samuel!” Again he jumped up and went to Eli. “Eli, did you call me?” Again Eli responded, “No, Samuel I did not call you.” Finally a third time, Samuel heard the voice and this time Eli told him, the next time the voice calls out say, “Speak Lord, I hear you.”
Samuel’s mother, Hannah, had created a legacy of prayer in her family that continued on to young Samuel and Samuel’s back and forth communication with God continued throughout his life.
If you’re wondering how you can pray, get your inspiration from Hannah and Samuel. Have the courage to pour your heart out to God and then the patience to listen.
Sample Prayer if You Haven’t Prayed Before
If you feel intimidated about praying, don’t worry. You’re in good company. Even the disciples, Jesus’ students who followed him around during his 3 year ministry, felt intimidated. They asked Jesus to teach them how to pray and this is where we get the prayer popularly known as, The Lord’s Prayer, which says,
Our Father Who Is in Heaven
Dear God,
This is my first time praying to you, and I’m not exactly sure what to say. Life has been stressful and complicated lately. I’ve tried so many different ways to sort my thoughts and solve my problems. I’ve heard people recommend that I talk to you, but I’m not sure how to get started. Please guide me on this journey to know you better. Help me to hear your voice speaking to me. Please forgive me of the things that I’ve done that are wrong and that separate me from you. Guide me to people who can help me know more about you. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.
How to Pray According to the Bible
Prayers in the Bible vary as much as the people of the Bible. There are prayers for victory in battle, prayers to get pregnant, prayers for healing and prayers for safety. The common denominator in all the prayers is faith, which means believing that God is who He says He is and that He can do what He says He can do.
- Verses that teach about prayer (e.g. Lord’s Prayer).
- Attitudes the Bible encourages in prayer (faith, humility, persistence).
- Emphasize that there is no “perfect” wording — God listens to the heart.
Simple Prayers for Beginners (Teach Me to Pray)
- Provide a few short beginner prayers (morning, bedtime, gratitude, asking for guidance).
- Encourage readers to personalize their words.
Common Questions About Prayer
There may be many questions you have about prayer, especially if it’s not something you’re familiar with or didn’t grow up with. For example, does it matter how you pray? Does it matter if you stand or raise your hands? Does it matter if you kneel down and close your eyes and fold your hands? And, how long should you pray?
In my book, Fish Food, I give the example that prayer is like asking God for a bicycle and in response He sends you a bike kit with all the bike parts and tells you He will help you put the bike together.
In the Bible we are invited to pray without ceasing. How can we pray without ceasing.
You see prayer is a process. It’s an ongoing conversation with a friend. It is the ebb and flow of the ocean. It is the speaking and listening of a conversation. So there are not hard and fast rules for prayer.
So, somethigns you may find yourself raising your hands in prayer. Other times you may find yourself kneeling in prayer or driving in the car in prayer. The most important thing to do is to pray.
Open your heart to God, be honest with Him and come before Him in humility. If you don’t know how to pray or what to say, simply tell Him that.
Tips to Build a Prayer Habit
One of the best things I’ve done over the years is keep a prayer journal. It’s been a powerful way to keep track of the things I’ve prayed about and the way God has moved in my life.
When I’ve been the most consistent in keeping the journal has been when I’ve done a challenge, like the one in my book, The Invitaiton, which is a 14 day challenge to give God Your worries while learning how to delight in Him.
I’ve also kept journals after major life events, like after a breakup, when I’ve really needed a place to pour out my heart and see God show up.
The most important part is to develop a prayer habir..
When Prayer Feels Difficult
If we’re all honest, sometimes, it feels difficult to pray. Sometimes we lose trust in God and we become overwhelmed by our sitation. Sometiems we hear God loud and clear and other times we’re straining just to hear a whisper from him.
When you feel like God is far from you, claim promises such as, “The Lord is close to the broken hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. Psalm 34:18.
Feeling distant from God is normal. Sometimes you might experience Him in big and obvious ways. He might speak clearly into your life and your situation and other times, you might be clinging to a word He’s given you months ago, just waiting for Him to say something else.
Even when Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, He felt like God had abandoned Him. We have it recorded in the Bible that He said in Matthew 27:46, My God, My God, why have you abandoned me?”
However, after Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, we can see that Jesus felt that connection again. This teaches us that we can’t rely on our feelings to show us how connected we are to God. Sometimes we may feel distant but it doesn’t mean God is far away from us and can’t hear us.
In these moments, it’s important that we keep showing up, even when it doesn’t feel like it will make a difference because prayer is our way to stay connected with God.
The Journey to Learning How to Pray
As you go on this journey to learn how to pray, remember that pray is a way that you connect with God. There is no magic formula, but there is an opportunity to grow in your relationship with God.
I invite you to start today. Simply speak from your heart and tell God where you are and He can pick you up and take you where He wants you to be.
If you want to read more about prayer, you can check out chapter 4 in my book, Fish Food.
