Lent - Some tips for the season. #1

Posted by GregQualls

February 9, 2008

photo by: Lori Morris

I have to be honest, this is actually the first time that I’ve participated in the Lent season. If you don’t know what Lent is, wikipedia states it as so:

Lent, in most Christian denominations, is the forty-day liturgical season of fasting and prayer before Easter. The forty days represent the time Jesus spent in the desert, where, according to the Bible, he endured temptation by Satan. Different churches will calculate the forty days differently.

The purpose of Lent, like most Christian seasons, it to be a special time where you grow closer to God and those around you. You are to do this through three ways: prayer, fasting/self denial, and generosity. Now I’m not a master at any of these…but I’d like to give you some advise from what I have learned over the years (I sound like a wise old sage…um…I’m not).

Prayer

I must say that prayer has only increased in my life in the past few months to where I could even start to give someone advice. Before then, it was simply something I would do during the typical expected times (at meals, church, ect). I’ve only recently come to begin to understand how God uses prayer to draw us closer to Him and as a tool to complete His work. With that being said, here are some simple tips to help with your prayer time during Lent.

Set up Triggers in your life.
I’ve talked about triggers in a previous post. This is taking something that you normally do in your life and using it to “trigger” you to do things that wouldn’t normally do. For example, most people use sitting down for dinner as trigger to pray for the meal (I hope you’re not one of those people that pray for like two hours before every meal…that’s really annoying). Take things that you do everyday, and make them triggers for you to pray. Some of my favorites are taking a shower, using the bathroom, getting in your car, making coffee, getting in bed, getting ready to read your Bible, finishing reading your Bible, driving to work, driving home, finishing lunch, eating eggs, sailing on a boat, scratching your nose, and buying a tambourine. You get the idea. Take things that you do everyday and use them as a trigger to pray.
Have a plan.
This is probably my biggest short-coming. I’m a random prayer. Whatever comes to my head at the time is what I pray for. For this reason, I’m constantly praying for the same things over and over (these are mainly food, finances, my future, my son, and my wife). This isn’t necessarily bad. But there are a lot more things in my life that I would like to pray about/for (did he just end a sentence with two prepositions…yes he did). So have a standard place where you keep track of all the things that you want to pray about. Then review this list at least once a day. This way nothing gets left behind.
Talk to God.
This might sound dumb to some, but for me this was an epiphany. I don’t know if you noticed this or not, but over the years I’ve discovered that people like to use what I call “prayer talk.” You know what I’m talking about (if you don’t…go to a prayer meeting and you’ll know). This is where a person suddenly embodies the spirit of Benny Hen and sees how many times they can say the words God, Father God, Lord, or Jesus (whichever is the persons favorite) in a prayer. Shannon and I actually have a game where we will count how many times someone uses one of these words in their prayers (I know…we’re a bunch a heathens…but Jesus loves us just the same).It came as a surprise to me that I could actually just talk to God. I didn’t have to use His name as the punctuation to every sentence. I didn’t have to speak in old English. I could just talk to Him. Just like I talk to my friends about my troubles and my successes, I can talk to Him. I can tell Him my struggles and failures. I can tell Him jokes. I can even be angry and yell at Him (read a few Psalms and you’ll get the idea). Prayer is me simply talking to God. No flair. No technicalities. No special formulas. Just talking.
Write it down.
This one comes from my wife and Dave Ortega (Dave you need to get a blog so I can link to you). I’m not good at this, but for the two previously mentioned they swear by it. My wife has several spiral notebooks that she has filled with her prayers over the years. This has been really cool, because she can look back and see how God has answered her prayers.Dave does the same. The last time I talked to him about the subject, he said the biggest tip he could give someone was to not set a limit. That means no minimum or maximum. It puts an unnecessary burden on you. Some days he will write pages worth of prayer to God. Other days it will be the simple phrase, “God help me.” The idea is to simple write it out.
Keep it simple.
Awhile back I learned that, during the time of Jesus (and I think it might be true for today too), Jews would have standard prayers for everything that they would do. You would have a standard prayer for plowing a field, eating a meal, drinking wine…even going to the bathroom. The key was that most of these prayers were only a sentence long. The reality is that our prayers don’t have to be 5 minutes long for God to hear us (once again with you guys who like to pray until my food it cold…stop it). Sometimes the simplest prayers are the best prayers. If you can only think of a few things to say to God, then say them. God isn’t keeping a tally of how much you pray. He just want to hear from you.
Keep it sweet.
Remember who you are talking to. While God is the King of the Universe, He is also the Lover of your soul. I think the reason that David was a man after God’s own heart was because he was passionate and honest with God. He was open and honest as you can only be with a closest friend. I think the worst prayer isn’t a long prayer or a prayer said in Old English but a prayer that has no heart. If you aren’t praying out of a love for God, then are you really praying. The reality is that this is the core of all prayer…to seek the face of God….to seek after His heart. Prayer is one of the most intimate times we have with God. Treat it that way.