5 Ways To Grow in Prayer

Prayer is an essential part of the Christian life. The Christian life can be thought of as a great voyage across great waters that begins in this life and continues in the life after. A voyage with high points of adventure and danger.

A voyage interspersed with stretches of sometimes tedious and sometimes hard labor. If you have ever rowed a boat across a lake you know what I am talking about. 🚣‍♀️

(I began writing this on a rowboat.  Tragically, a loon startled me, sending me and my laptop overboard. I confess that I provoked the bird. As it swam past I said several times, rather sarcastically, “Lost your mind have you?” It then flew at me.)

Prayer is a way we navigate this voyage. It is how we harness the tremendous power of the spiritual winds of the Holy Spirit for this voyage. Prayer is a strengthening to keep us on course during this voyage.

Perhaps, most importantly, prayer is how we come to know the one who voyages with us along the way, the Heavenly Captain, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Here are five ways to develop your life of prayer, whether you are a just beginning your spiritual voyage or whether you are an experienced spiritual seafarer:

1. Set Your Course Each Day through Prayer

Find a time to pray exclusively each day. By exclusive I mean a time you set aside only for prayer and devotion. A time you set aside each day, at approximately the same time each day, to meet with the Lord. An opportunity to be strengthened for the voyage ahead.

An opportunity to pray over your day. A time to pray for the people in your life. A time to listen to God. An opportunity to reset the course of your life.  🧭  

This quiet time could be for two minutes. It could be for twenty. For most people this will be in the morning, but for others it will be before they go to bed. The time of day is less important.

What is important is developing this as a daily habit. This daily appointment sets the sail of your soul, inviting God into the details of your life and releasing spiritual power into your day.

2. Pray to Adjust Your Sail Each Day

St. Francis De Sales, the 16th century spiritual director and guide said:

“Sprinkle a seasoning of short prayers on your daily living. If you see something beautiful, thank God for it. If you are aware of someone’s need, ask God to help…You can toss up many such prayers all day long. They will help you in your meditation and in your secular employment as well. Make a habit of it.”

Introduction to the Devout Life

These little prayers can adjust the sails of your soul to meet your day’s dosage of choppy waters. These prayers will usually be brief, maybe nothing more than a quick, “Thank you God” or a frustrated “Lord give me patience to help this person!”

You can season your day with these little prayers even without words, simply by pausing with prayerful intention toward God. 🙏    

3. Pray As a Member of the Crew  

Pray regularly with other members of the crew. This means worshipping at your  local church. It can also mean praying in smaller groups with friends and family. We are all members of the great fleet of God’s people.

Even when you feel lost at sea and far from any friendly shore or ship, you are connected by the power of the Holy Spirit with other believers. (Just be on the lookout for loons).

Praying regularly with others strengthens your awareness that you never pray alone. Praying regularly with others strengthens your own ability to pray, especially when the storms of life threaten to throw you off the ship of faith into the cold waters of despair.

Thankfully, prayer when offered with others can become a faith saving rope, securing you safely on deck.  🦺

4. More Than Petitions to Reach New Destinations

The Catechism in the Book of Common Prayer lists several kinds of prayer:  

       “The principal kinds of prayer are adoration, praise, thanksgiving, penitence, oblation, intercession and petition”

Petition is prayer you offer for yourself. Intercession is prayer you offer for others. Some spiritual writers use these terms interchangeably. In either case they are “asking prayers.”

Christian prayer is relational. In a trusting relationship it is appropriate to share our concerns, our needs, and even our wants.  Yes, there is a place for petition in your prayer life.

However, if you desire to reach new destinations in your spiritual voyage, you need to regularly practice other kinds of prayer: prayers of confession,  prayers of thanksgiving, and  prayers of praise.

You may learn to pray with Scripture or to pray with beads. As you grow in prayer the Spirit will grow in you a greater awareness of God love’s and a greater ability to love others (Matthew 22:36-40). 🧾

5.Persist Whatever the Conditions with Prayer

The most faithful thing you can do and the most helpful thing you can do to cultivate a regular prayer life is to persist in praying. Whether your voyage is presently turbulent or presently serene and whether you “feel” like praying or not, the key is to keep at it.

Sister Miriam Pollard, O.C.S.O., in her book, The Laughter of God writes:

“The most important part of prayer technique is to keep at it, to give it a daily place in our lives. If we are faithful to a daily amount of prayer, we will want to pray at other times during the day, in our various needs and activities. Even if the prayer time seems to be more than a refined nuisance, it is giving life to the rest of our day.”

(Excuse me, I just received an email from the Canadian Association for the Advocacy of Loons. In response, I attest that no loons were harmed in the research or writing of this article. Several jokes follow from here but let us finish up for now.)

 The Christian life is a great voyage, a high seas adventure of the soul. The heavenly Captain, Jesus Christ, has promised to be with us (Matthew 28:20).

So we will sail on faithfully through storm and sunrise until we arrive on that heavenly shore. In the meantime, with your Captain and crew, persist in prayer. Adventure awaits. Anchors away! ⚓   

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