Ever wondered what to pray about every day? Like you wake up in the morning, you sit on the edge of your bed, maybe you open your Bible, and then you just sit there because you don't know where to start.
Do I pray for my family?
Do I pray about my job?
Do I pray about that situation that's been bothering me for weeks?
Do I just repeat the same things I prayed yesterday?
And if you're honest, sometimes you feel like your prayer list is just a recycled version of your worry list.
The same problems, the same fears, the same requests day after day, month after month.
And deep down, a question starts to form.
Is this really what prayer is supposed to look like?
I want to tell you about a man named James. James had been a Christian for 11 years. He attended church every Sunday. He had a prayer journal. He prayed every morning without fail. But if you asked him what he prayed about, he would pull out that journal and show you the same list he'd been carrying for years. His health, his finances, his children, his job situation. A few people he was interceding for, good things, legitimate things. But James told me something that has stayed with me. He said, "I pray every day, but I never feel like anything is actually happening. I feel like I'm talking to a wall."
And the moment he said it, I knew exactly what the problem was. James was not praying wrong because he lacked faith. James was praying wrong because nobody had ever shown him what apostle Paul prayed. Because let's discovered when we went deep into the Pauline epistles. Romans, Ephesians, Colossians, Philippians, we found something that completely stopped us in our tracks.
Apostle Paul almost never prayed that way. Not once in any of his recorded prayers did Paul ask God to fix a problem. Not once did he pray from a place of desperation or confusion.
So what did apostle Paul pray? That is exactly what today's teaching is about. Because here is the crisis we identified in the body of Christ.
Most of us are praying from the wrong position entirely.
We pray from a place of lack.
We pray like beggars standing at a locked door when the door has been open the entire time.
But apostle Paul prayed from a completely different place. Paul prayed from revelation.
And when you understand the difference, everything about your prayer life changes forever.
There are four prayers in Paul's letters that we are going to study and apply our entire life.
Four prayers that are not about asking God for things, but about opening your eyes to what you already have.
And when you begin to pray them every single day, you stop living like a beggar. You start living like what you actually are, a joint heir with the King of the universe. Let's look at the first one.
¶Prayer 1. Ephesians 1:17-19.
In Ephesians 1, starting at verse 15, apostle Paul writes one of the most extraordinary prayers in the entire Bible.
He says, "I cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers."
And then he tells us exactly what he is praying. He is not praying for their problems.
He is not praying that their circumstances would improve.
He is not asking God to show up and rescue them from difficulty.
He is praying this that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of HIM.
Wisdom, revelation, knowledge. That is what apostle Paul is asking for on their behalf.
Now, let us make a distinction here that will change the way you read this prayer forever.
Note this and remember that, "Wisdom and knowledge are not the same thing. Knowledge is information. Wisdom is the ability to use it."
You can read your Bible every morning and still feel stuck. Because reading is not the same as seeing.
Information is not the same as revelation.
And what apostle Paul is asking for here is not more information about God.
He is asking that our spirits would have the ability to grasp what has already been given to us because here is the truth that we kept coming back to.
We are sitting on top of an inheritance and living like beggars.
We have been given access to the throne and we're still standing at the door knocking.
Apostle Paul's prayer is not "God give them more." Paul's prayer is, "God, open their eyes to what they already have."
That one shift will revolutionize your entire prayer life.
Apostle Paul continues in that same prayer. He says he is asking that the eyes of your heart would be enlightened. Not the eyes of your head, not your intellect, not your natural reasoning, but the eyes of your heart.
Remember this is the spirit of the man, the deepest part of you where revelation is actually received.
Your intellect can read the Word, but only your spirit can see it. Only your spirit can grasp what the mind alone cannot reach.
And this is why so many believers read their Bible every day and nothing changes in their lives.
They are reading with their heads.
When apostle Paul is praying that their hearts would see, he wants you to know three things through this prayer.
The hope of His calling, the riches of His inheritance in the saints, and the exceeding greatness of His ability toward those who believe, not His ability in general, but His ability toward you personally, specifically right now.
And that ability, is the same power that raised Christ from the dead.
The same power that pulled Jesus Christ out of the grave on the third day is at work in you right now.
Apostle Paul is praying that you would know this, really know it, not as a doctrine, not as a theological concept, but as a living, breathing reality in your spirit.
So here is how you pray this first prayer every morning.
You do not just read it. You personalize it.
You say out loud, "Father, give me a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of you. Open the eyes of my heart. Let me know the hope of your calling on my life. Let me know the riches of your inheritance in me. And let me know the exceeding greatness of your ability that is working in me right now."
You are not asking God for something he hasn't given. You are asking HIM to open your eyes to what he already has given.
That is prayer #1. And it alone could transform everything.
Most people have prayed Ephesians 1:17-19 as a casual read through.
But let us prayed it as a saint who is desperate to see. Not desperate in fear, but desperate in hunger. There is a difference.
Fear begs. hunger seeks and the promise is that those who seek, find.
¶Prayer 2. Ephesians 3:14-19.
Now we come to what many consider apostle Paul's greatest prayer. t
This is the prayer in Ephesians 3 beginning at verse 14.
Apostle Paul says for this cause I bow my knees unto the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, and then he begins to pray something that will completely stretch your understanding of what God actually wants for your life. That he would grant you according to the riches of His glory. That ye may be strengthened with ability through His Spirit in the inward man.
Strengthened with ability through His spirit in the inward man.
We stop on this phrase and meditate there for some time.
"It doesn't seem to me that we can ever be weak or failures again. Because when the Spirit of the Living God is strengthening your inner man with his own ability, what does that leave room for? Nothing. It strips us of weakness. It strips us of inability. It clothe us with the very ability of God from on High."
And I want you to notice something important.
Apostle Paul is not praying that God would fix the external world. He is praying that God would build something unshakable in your internal world. Because when the inside is strong, the outside loses its power over you. Think about that.
Most of us spend our entire prayer life asking God to change what is happening around us. But apostle Paul prays for something far more powerful.
He prays that what is happening inside us would become stronger than anything happening outside us.
That is a completely different kind of prayer and it produces a completely different kind of person.
Apostle Paul continues, he is praying that Christ may dwell in your hearts on the ground of faith. Not visit, not pass through occasionally, dwell, make His permanent home and be established in you.
And the result of that dwelling is that you become rooted and grounded in love, not influenced by love occasionally, not moved by love when you feel like it, but rooted in it, grounded in it, established in it.
Yes, you are rooted in love, grounded in love, established in love.
And remember, that "This is the choicest experience that can ever come to the human heart."
When you are so rooted in the love of God that circumstances cannot uproot you. When the storms of life come, you do not bend and break. You do not collapse. You are deeply rooted in Christ.
Think about a tree in a storm. The branches move, the leaves shake, but the roots hold. And the deeper the roots go, the less the storm above can do.
Apostle Paul is praying that your roots would go so deep into the love of God that no storm this life brings could pull you out of the ground.
And then apostle Paul prays something almost impossible to understand with your natural mind. That you may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge.
He is asking you to know something that surpasses knowledge.
Your intellect cannot get here. Your reasoning cannot reach this. This is revelation territory.
This is the place where only your spirit can go led by the Holy Spirit into the deep things of God.
And then apostle Paul closes with this. That you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Not a portion of God, not a measure of God. But the fullness of God .
Here is a question, "What does it mean to be filled with all the fullness of God?"
It means that the very life, the very nature, the very ability, the very love of the Father becomes the substance of your inner world.
You are no longer running on natural resources.
You are running on divine resources.
And notice how apostle Paul seals this prayer. He says, "Now unto HIM who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the ability that worketh in us, above all that we ask or think.
You cannot out ask what God is willing to do.
You cannot out imagine what He has prepared.
The only limit is the ability that is working in us and that ability is His own.
So here is how you pray this second prayer every morning. "Father, strengthen me with ability through your spirit in my inner man. Let Christ make his permanent home in my heart. Root me and ground me in your love. Let me comprehend what is beyond comprehension. Fill me with all of your fullness and do in my life exceeding abundantly above all that I can ask or think."
You are not begging.
You are agreeing with what apostle Paul already declared is God's will for your life.
And don't rush past that last line, exceeding abundantly above all that you can ask or think.
Remember now, "'This sentence alone should silence every doubt you have ever had about whether God is willing."
The question was never God's willingness. The question has always been our seeing.
¶Prayer 3, Colossians 1:9-12.
The third prayer is found in Colossians 1, beginning at verse 9.
Note closed, "This prayer gives us an intimation of the passion of the Father to make Himself known to us in such a real way that we can enter into all the riches of the fullness of His life that belongs to us."
Read those words again slowly.
The passion of the Father to make Himself known to you.
God is not hiding from you. In reality, he never.
God is not withholding from you. Not once.
God actually has a passion to be known by you.
And this prayer is how that passion gets answered in your daily life.
Apostle Paul writes, "For this cause we also since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray and make request for you that ye may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding."
The word knowledge here in the Greek is epignosis.
Let's be very specific about this word.
Epignosis does not mean casual knowledge. It does not mean information you've heard. It does not mean facts you've collected about God over the years.
Epignosis means full knowledge, complete knowledge, exact knowledge.
God wants you to have exact knowledge of His will, not approximate, not general, not 'I think this might be what God wants for my life'. Exact.
And here is what makes this so personal.
God has given you His Holy Spirit as your teacher for exactly this purpose.
The same Spirit that inspired these words through apostle Paul lives in you right now and His entire assignment is to fill you with exact knowledge of the Father's will in every situation you face.
That means you do not have to wake up confused.
You do not have to stumble through your day wondering if you're in God's will.
You have a teacher on the inside, One who has never been wrong, never run out of answers, and never grown tired of teaching you.
And when you speak out this prayer, you are activating that relationship.
You are saying to the Holy Spirit, "l am ready to receive. l am open to your instruction.Teach me what I need to know today."
But notice what apostle Paul says this knowledge is for. It is to walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing.
It is to enable you to live in a way that represents God accurately in the earth. Not perfectly, but accurately. There is a difference.
Perfection is a standard you achieve.
Accuracy is a direction you walk in.
And apostle Paul is praying that your walk would accurately reflect who God is. In every room you enter, every conversation you have, every decision you make.
Here is a real life testimony . A story about a woman who had recently come to Christ. Her husband was a worldly man. After a few weeks of living with his transformed wife, he said to her one morning, "Do you know woman? I have been living and sleeping and eating with Jesus Christ for the last 2 weeks." She said, "How do you enjoy it?" Tears filled his eyes. He said, "I wish I was like that. I wish I had that something that has come into your life. That is what it means to walk worthy of the Lord. Jesus Christ was so magnified in her that her husband encountered Christ simply by being in the same room as his wife.
You do not have to announce yourself. When you walk worthy of the Lord, the presence announces itself.
That woman did not go home and try harder to be more spiritual. She did not follow a self-improvement program. She prayed this prayer.
She let the Word build something real on the inside. And what was built on the inside became visible on the outside. That is always how it works.
Apostle Paul continues the prayer, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God, strengthened with all might according to His glorious power unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness.
Joyfulness in the middle of longsuffering. This is not the natural result of difficult circumstances.
Nobody becomes joyful through longsuffering on their own. This is the supernatural fruit of a life that knows who is living on the inside.
And notice apostle Paul does not say strengthened with some might.
He does not say strengthened with enough might to get by.
He says strengthened with all might according to His glorious power. All of it, the full measure, not a portion that fits your level of faith, but the full strength of God made available to your inner man.
And then he closes, giving thanks unto the Father who has given us the ability to enjoy our share of the inheritance of the saints in light, the ability to enjoy your inheritance.
Pause for a while, saint of God.
"God is not just giving you the inheritance. He is giving you the ability to enjoy it."
Because what good is an inheritance you can't access?
What good is wealth you do not believe belongs to you?
What good is a feast you do not believe you're invited to?
God wants you to draw dividends on what Christ purchased.
God wants you to live in the richness of your redemption.
Not just know about it theoretically but enjoy it practically daily.
So here is how you pray this third prayer every morning.: "Father fill me with the exact knowledge of your will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding . Let me walk worthy of you today in everything I do. Make me fruitful in every good work. Strengthen me with all might according to your glorious power and give me the ability to enjoy my share of the inheritance you have prepared for me. "
¶Prayer 4, Philippians 4: 6-7.
The fourth prayer is not a prayer apostle Paul prays for others. It is the prayer principle that apostle Paul himself lived by every single day.
In Philippians 4:6-7, Paul writes, "In nothing, be anxious, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God."
Now, I want you to notice something that most people completely miss in this verse.
The instruction is not pray and then worry while you wait for the answer.
The instruction is pray with thanksgiving.
Meaning before you see the answer, you are already giving thanks.
Before the circumstance changes, you are already grateful.
Before the manifestation comes, you are already at rest.
This is not denial. This is not pretending the problem doesn't exist. This is praying from the position of someone who already knows how the story ends.
And notice apostle Paul does not say pray about the big things. He does not say pray about the things that really matter.
He says in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving. Everything.
The small anxieties, the quiet worries that creep in before you even get out of bed. The low-grade fear that hums in the background of your day. All of it brought before God.
Not with trembling, not with begging, but with thanksgiving.
Because thanksgiving is not just an attitude. Thanksgiving is a declaration.
It declares, "I already know the outcome. I already know my Father has heard me. I already know that what he started, he will finish."
Think about what it would look like to approach every single morning that way.
Not starting your day with a list of problems you're handing to God and hoping he deals with, but starting your day with thanksgiving.
Genuinely, specifically personally thanking HIM for what he has already done, what he is already doing, and what he has already promised to do.
That practice alone will transform the atmosphere of your inner life because you cannot be anxious and thankful at the same time. They cannot occupy the same space.
When thanksgiving fills the room, anxiety has nowhere to stand because of what comes next.
And the peace of God which passes all understanding shall guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus.
The peace of God stands guard over your heart. It is not something you manufacture. It is not something you talk yourself into. It is the peace that comes when you pray with thanksgiving.
When you bring your request before God, not as a beggar who is unsure if he cares, but as a son, as a daughter who knows his or her Father has already heard him or her.
Bear in mind that, "When we know what our redemption means to the Father and what he intended it should mean to us, then we pass out of the realm of worry and fear and doubt. Out of that realm entirely."
And then apostle Paul reveals something in Philippians 4:11 that shows us the inner world of a man who has lived these prayers for years. I have learned in whatsoever state l am therein to be independent of circumstances.
Independent of circumstances, not unaffected, apostle Paul was affected.
He suffered deeply. He was beaten, shipwrecked, imprisoned, abandoned by friends. But he was not defined by those circumstances.
He was not controlled by them.
He was not at the mercy of them because Philippians 4:13 was not a scripture he quoted when things got hard.
It was the baseline of his daily life. I can do allI things in HIM who strengthenth me.
Not I hope l can. Not I'm trying.
I can. Present tense. Settled.
The confession of a man who has prayed the Pauline prayers long enough that they have become the very substance of his inner world.
So here is how you pray this fourth prayer every morning.
🙏🏽 "Father, I bring everything before you today with thanksgiving, not with anxiety, not with fear, but with thanksgiving. Because I know you have already heard me. I receive your peace right now. The peace that passes all understanding. Guard my heart and my mind in Christ Jesus today and remind me throughout this day that I can do all things through HIM who strengthens me."
Now, let me show you what happens when you put all four of these prayers together.
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