Great Dunmow Baptist Church

We had a really good sermon on prayer recently. There's 2 ways of communicating with God: "praying always" and "supplication" (from Ephesians 6:18).

Praying always is walking and talking with God like you do with a friend - "Sorry, Lord" "Help me sort out this stroppy child?" "Stop me saying something I shouldn't" and perhaps if you're that close to your friend you might hear him murmur "Mind you don't trip on that".

Supplication is the detailed prayer where you've thought about what you really need and you do the "effective fervent prayer of a righteous man" bit; where you seek God's will on a subject that concerns you; where you ask God to show you specific sins in your life rather than getting to the end of the day and not being able to think of any; and where you write down what you've prayed for so you notice when its answered.

I have a nasty feeling that 90% of the time I don't do either. Its not real communication at all. At best its that polite conversation you make with someone because you think you ought to. So I'm aiming to do the effective fervent prayer bit regarding having a real, useful, best friend relationship with God.

The sermon recorded on MP3 can be found here.