Philippians 4:6 says "Be anxious about nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God." My friend prayer is like breath ... You cannot live without it. Think about this: What was the first thing the Early Church did after Jesus' ascension? "They returned to Jerusalem…to an upper room" and "continued with one accord in prayer and supplication..." (Acts 1:12-14).
Even a casual reading of the book of Acts confirms how totally the disciples depended upon prayer — how they dared not make a move without committing to prayer, seeking God for His guidance and deliverance through prayer.
"And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers" (Acts 2:42).
"Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer..." (Acts 3:1).
"But we will give ourselves continually to prayer..." (Acts 6:4). "...prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God..." (Acts 12:5).
If those who walked alongside our Lord for three years were dependent upon prayer, how much more so are we? What a grave mistake we make if we are casual about our prayer life.
We're told to cry out to Him as our "Abba" Father — literally translated, "Daddy." (Romans 8:15, Galatians 4:6).
We Pray to Invite God ~ It's very important to understand this: we are inviting God into our lives when we pray.
When we pray, we experience —
Fellowship. We become "workers together with Him" (2 Corinthians 6:1). When we pray, God gives us the joy and privilege of administrating His kingdom, His affairs — working together with Him. He could do it without us. We could not do it without Him. But what a glory that God allows us the privilege of doing it with Him!
• Development. When we pray, God is growing us. Have you ever prayed and didn't receive immediately what you asked for? What did you do? You kept on praying, but you also began to search your heart and life to see if something was hindering God's answer. Many times there is. God uses prayer to grow us.
• Dependency. God never wants us to live lives independent of Him. If God just did everything for us and we never had to pray, soon we would begin to take things for granted. We would cease to depend upon God.
Prayer Binds Us to God
That's why we tell God what He already knows. He knows what we have need of before we ask, but we're definitely, specifically, unqualifiedly told to pray and to ask — not to impress or inform God, but to invite God, so that we might have that fellowship with Him, so that we might grow, and we would learn to depend upon Him.
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