Prayer has to be intentional, and its purpose well understood. Prayer is a call of the deep to the deep. As the bible says in Psalm 42:7, “deep calls to deep.” This speaks about oneness. It talks about fellowship. We that are praying must understand one purpose; that God created us in the beginning in His image and likeness. This means we must have a recognition of whom we are coming to. He is the LORD God Almighty. He knows all things, He sees all things, He can do all things, and He is present everywhere. He is Holy and the Judge of the whole earth. This recognition of whom we are coming to naturally should predispose one thing in us, “worship.”
As we stand in awe of Him and worship, we see our filthy estate, like prophet Isaiah saw and cried out in Isaiah 6:5: “Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.” Being made of dust, we are also of filthy garment that is our mortal flesh. Our natural cry in prayer thus should be a cry unto God to clothe upon us, to touch our lips and cleanse it and to shed in our hearts His love by His Spirit whom He has given us, that we may love Him with all our hearts, our souls, our minds and all of our strength. The goal is that we might be one with Him, that we might have fellowship with Him. Prayer is not a shop card. The purpose is for oneness and fellowship with God.
Our ultimate desire to be one with Him, which should be the intention of our prayer, naturally disposed us to desire that His will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Here is the sweetest part of it all, to be a vessel to have His will accomplished on earth. Like our Lord Jesus said in Psalm 40 verses 7 and 8: “Behold, I have come; It is written of Me in the scroll of the book, I delight to do Your will, O my God, And Your law is within my heart.” It is written in the volume of the book for every man to do the will of God that created him. Thus, having this understanding, we ask the LORD God, in our deep calling to deep, what is our allotted lot for the day and for the season. What will He have us do in His scheme of things, for He rules over all His creation and in all the earth. We cry unto Him in this regard to fill us with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding (Colossians 1: 9) so that we do nothing by human reasoning or out of fleshly zeal. This is the other purpose of prayer.
The more we ask to be one with Him, the more we acknowledge in awe who He is and worship, and the more we yield ourselves to be a vessel to get His will on earth done, the more we are aware that in Him consist all things: “thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory.” The more we see our utter dependence on Him: “Apart from Me, you can do nothing (John 15:5).” This culminates in our total surrender: “as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the children of God (Romans 8: 14).” As children of God, we walk in His power, having authority to subdue all things to the Lordship of our Lord Jesus. We walk in His love, epitomising the character of this love as enunciated in 1 Corinthians chapter 13. We also walk in His provision by His divine Providence because all things are ours, and we have been blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Ephesians 1: 3).
The beauty of a life of prayer is that it is not only relieved on the knees, but it can be lived out in our daily walk. We can have oneness with our heavenly Father as we meditate on His word and pray under our breath (Joshua1: 8). We can maintain an attitude of worship by singing Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs in our hearts unto the LORD (Ephesians5: 19). We yield to Him by being sensitive to the leading of His Spirit to accomplish His will for us and through us. A life of prayer as evidenced by our Lord Jesus Christ is a life in oneness (John 17: 11, 23) and fellowship with the heavenly Father and fulfilling His will in everything in love, in power and sound mind (depicted in godly wisdom, godly character and right actions).
