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A while back I wrote about the 8 most dangerous Christian prayers. Afterwards, I realized that one of the most dangerous prayers of all was the Lord’s prayer, which we have also looked at briefly before.

Let us now take a closer look at the Lord’s Prayer and see why it contains several dangerous prayer requests.

The Lord’s Prayer is full of dangerous prayers which can destroy your life.

Each line of the Lord’s prayer is designed to invite God into your life to overthrow, upend, and destroy your life. When you pray the Lord’s prayer, God enters your life like a bull in a china shop.

Afterwards, however, God takes all the shards of crystal and glass that He left behind, and makes the most beautiful mosaic you have ever seen.

If you pray the Lord’s prayer, get ready for destruction … but the beauty that rises from the ashes will be incomparable to whatever plans you had for your life previously.

Here is a quick run-through of how each line in the Lord’s Prayer will upend, overturn, and destroy your life as you know it.

Hallowed be thy name

In praying this, we announce that we want God’s name to be glorified. Sounds good, right?

Yes, except that usually, when we pray this, what we mean is “Hollowed be they name in and through me.” We want God to be gloried, and we want to ride His coat tails to some glory of our own.

But the prayer doesn’t say this will happen. It is a prayer for God’s name to be glorified; not our name.

Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven

This seems fairly safe, right? Haven’t many of us been taught to close out our prayers with “Not my will, but thy will be done?” Don’t we want God’s will to be done on earth?

Sure!

… Just not in our lives.

When it comes to our own lives, we want our own will to be done. God’s will for our lives usually looks much less enjoyable than our plans for our own life.

And besides, God’s will often seems to lead into death, slavery, obscurity, and suffering. Who wants that? Not me.

So this prayer is dangerous when we include ourselves in it.

Give us this day our daily bread

Daily bread means “enough food for today.” It means barely scraping by. But who wants that? I need a full fridge and a growing retirement account. I need a new car, a shinier cell-phone, a faster internet connection, and maybe an Apple iWatch.

And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgiven those who trespass against us

Of course we want God to forgive us, but are you ready to forgive the person who has wronged you?

… Um, maybe not yet.

Enough said.

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil

God doesn’t actually lead anyone into temptation, so this phrase probably means something closer to “Help us resist temptation when it comes.”

But regardless, we don’t really mean it. We like our pet sins. We don’t want God to point them out to us, nor do we want to get rid of them.

Instead, what we usually do, is invent other “sins” that we “struggle” so that we can make ourselves feel better about the small victories we gain over these fake sins while completely ignoring the bigger sins we harbor in our lives every day.

What sorts of sins? Oh, greed, pride, anger, and judgmentalism to name a few.

The Lord’s Prayer is Dangerous

So be careful about praying the Lord’s Prayer. Every phrase is a minefield just waiting for you to step on it so that your life can get turned upside down.

Here is a video in which I teach a bit more about the Lord’s Prayer:

The Disciple’s Prayer – Matthew 6:9-13

Do you want to pray like never before?

Do you what to talk to God like you talk to a friend? Do you want to see more answers to prayer?

If you have these (and other) questions about prayer, let me send you some teaching and instruction about prayer to your email inbox. You will receive one or two per week, absolutely free. Fill out the form below to get started.

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The 8 Most Dangerous Christian Prayers… #5 Ruined my Life

By Jeremy Myers

238 Comments

There are different forms of Christian prayer, but whether you have a set prayer time or seek to communicate with God throughout the day (or some combination of both), here are 8 Christian prayers that are extremely dangerous to pray.

This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t pray them … we should! It just means that when we pray them, we should watch out!

Watch out for these dangerous prayers

1. Teach me humility.

After you pray this Christian prayer for humility, be ready for people to badmouth you, slander you, and drag your name through the mud. If you pray for humility, be ready for false accusations, for that “skeleton in the closet” to be revealed, or for people to belittle you and talk down to you as if you were inferior.

The only way to learn humility is to be placed in humbling situations, so if you pray for humility, be ready!

2. Teach me patience.

If you pray for patience, get ready to be surrounded by the most annoying people you have ever met. Get ready for your car to break down when you are late for an appointment. Get ready your children to go bonkers. Get ready for prayers to not get answered. Get ready for setbacks, roadblocks, and pitfalls.

Just like with all the other Christian prayers on this list, God teaches us patience by taking us through trying times.

3. Lead me wherever you want me to go.

One way this Christian prayer is often prayed is with the words, “Here I am, Lord, send me.”

Usually when we pray this Christian prayer, we think that God is going to send us into high profile ministry positions, places of honor and glory, and opportunities to be heard. This is why ministry leaders almost never “feel the leading of God” to go to smaller ministries and places of lesser significance. God always seems to “call” pastors and ministry professionals to bigger churches, richer ministries, and positions with greater power.

While I do not deny that God sometimes leads people in these directions, I think that more often than not, God wants to lead us downward, but we refuse to go. Of course, this does not mean that we will stay in the gutter if God leads us there. God may very well lift us up out of the gutter to a place of prominence, but when He does so, He gets the glory instead of us.

That’s why this is such a dangerous Christian prayer. We want to be used by God for great things in His kingdom, but God’s path to greatness usually does not mirror what we had in mind. God’s path to greatness usually leads to prison, death, and the gates of hell.

Also (and this fits with #1 above), when we pray this prayer, we will often be faced with a choice between two ministry positions, one that leads to honor, glory, and fame, and one that leads to obscurity and insignificance. Though the temptation is to choose glory and honor, such decisions may actually be a choice to follow Jesus downward into humility.

I once heard Francis Schaeffer say in an interview that if given the choice between two ministry positions, we should choose the one with less fame and glory.

4. Help me understand the plight of the poor.

This Christian prayer is like asking God to make you poor. Yikes! How can you understand the plight of the poor unless you become poor yourself?!

So do you like your nice house, your two cars, your steak dinners, and your Caribbean vacations? Don’t ask God to help you understand the plight of the poor.

5. Make me more like Jesus.

In one way or another, this has been a constant life prayer of mine. A couple years back, I realized that this prayer ruined my life.

I had my life all figure out, and it was all going according to my perfect plan. Then I started praying this prayer. Before long, all my hopes and dreams lay shattered around my feet. I often tried to pick up the pieces and glue everything back together, but God would come through with His baseball bat and smash it all to hell (almost literally… all of my plans and dreams deserved nothing more).

When you pray to be like Jesus, God will begin to break down, burn away, and slough off anything and everything in your life that does not look like Jesus. This sounds nice until you begin to experience it. The purification of our life may be with God’s refining fire, but it sill burns!

6. Give me more faith.

Christians like our beliefs in nice, neat packages. But life is not like that, and neither is life with God.

When Christians pray for God to give us more faith, we are likely to enter into some of the difficult and doubt-filled times of our lives. You will begin to question everything you have never known and everything you have ever believed. You may even begin to doubt God’s goodness and maybe even His existence.

This is not bad. Embrace the doubts. Understand that if what you believe it true, it can stand up against all questions. Truth does not fear a challenge. There is no other way for your faith to grow than for your faith to be tested.

7. Give me victory over sin and temptation.

How do you think victory comes, except through ever-increasing cycles of temptation? Sure, God does not send the temptations, and He never allows us to be tempted with more than we can bear, but if we pray for God to give us victory over sin and temptation, this is the same thing as asking God to strengthen us so that we can stand up under greater and greater temptations!

So if you pray this Christian prayer, be ready for an onslaught of all the wiles of the devil.

8. Please help my annoying neighbor/coworker come to Christ.

This is a great Christian prayer. Except guess how God is going to help your annoying neighbor or coworker come to Christ? That’s right. He’s going to use you.

I once heard a story of a Bible study group who decided to make a prayer list of all the people they “disliked” the most, and then pray for these people every week as part of the Bible study. Over the course of the next ten years, all but one of the people on that list became believers, and almost all of them became Christians because the members of that Bible study showed grace, love, mercy, and forgiveness to these “annoying” people.

If you are going to pray for someone, be prepared to answer your own prayers.

What Dangerous Christian Prayers have you prayed?

Have you prayed any of the prayers above and learned the hard way how dangerous these Christian prayers really were? Share some of your story in the comment section below. Also, if you have any dangerous Christian prayers to add to this list, let me know!

Do you want to pray like never before?

Do you what to talk to God like you talk to a friend? Do you want to see more answers to prayer?

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What is Prayer?

By Jeremy Myers

30 Comments

A reader recently sent in this question:

What is a prayer?

Now that is a concise question! Ha! Of course, it cannot be answered so concisely…but I will try.

What is prayer?

We can always begin by defining prayer according to the standard English, Greek, and Hebrew dictionaries, but I think that the person who asks “What is prayer?” is not so much looking for the dictionary definition of prayer, but rather, how to pray, and how to see answers to prayer.

So in trying to answer the question, “What is prayer?” I think the simplest and most practical answer is best.

You see, most people learn about prayer by listening to others pray, and this often leads to some very bad prayer habits and practices. Most people, when they pray, seem to think that prayer requires a spiritual tone of voice, a new set of words, a sing-songy cadence and rhythm, and maybe even the repetition of certain words or phrases.

So it is not uncommon to hear people pray this way::

Father God in heaven, holy art thou above all things, and thy name, Father God, is worthy to be praised, Father God. Hallelujah! Praise Jeeeezus! Can I hear an Amen?

Oh, Father God, Lord God, Holy Jesus, we come before you today, as your children, Father God, to beseech you with our many needs, Father God. But before we do so, oh Holy Father in Heaven, we ask thee to forgive us for our many sins. We have failed thee in so many ways, Father God, so that as the prophet Isaiah says, all our righteous works are as filthy rags before thee, Father God! And so we thank thee for sending thy holy Son, Jesus Christ, the Lord of the universe and the master of all, the Lamb who was slain before the foundation of the world, to die for our sins on that wretched cross, oh holy Father God, – Hallalejujah! – praise Jesus – so that we might be forgiven of our many trespasses against you, Father God…

And the prayer goes on this way for many minutes. What is prayer? Not this. The person doing the praying will often work himself up into a bit of a frenzy, until he is shouting and shaking, and people who are listening are nodding their heads, shouting “AMEN!” “HALLELUJAH!” “PRAISE JESUS!” and so on.

This may not be your practice in praying, but it is a common practice and illustrates that when it comes to the question of “What is prayer?” we often learn what prayer is not by thinking about prayer or learning from Scripture what prayer is, but rather learning by watching and listening to others pray, and frankly, we learn some very bad practices this way.

Even if you do not pray the way I have written above, listen to yourself pray sometime, and ask yourself, “Where did I learn how to pray this way?” Why am I saying these certain words? Why am I changing my voice? Why am I bowing my head and folding my hands? Why am I closing my eyes? Why do I pray to Jesus, or to the Holy Spirit? Why do I repeat this certain phrase over and over, or use those certain words?

So when it comes to asking, “What is prayer?” I like to tell people that prayer is nothing more than talking to God as you would talk to a spouse or a friend. Of course, although I have said it is “nothing more” than that, prayer is certainly nothing less! Think about it! The fact that we can talk to God as a man would talk to a friend! There is no idea more shocking, more amazing!

People are often jealous that Moses spoke to God as a man speaks to a friend, but the fact of the matter is that Jesus has enabled all people to speak to God in this way! We do not need a priestly mediator, or special words, or a holy language, or a spiritual frenzy in order for God to pay attention to us. All of that is religious prayer, which is not the kind of prayer God wants.

I think sometimes God sighs at our religious prayers. He rolls his eyes as we go on and on and on.

He is always paying attention to us, and is with us throughout the day, going where we go, doing what we do, and hanging out with us as we eat, as we work, as we drive. This means that we can talk to him as a man speaks to a friend.

What is prayer? It is simply telling God what is going on and keeping him the in the loop on your life. Are you angry? Tell God. Are you sad? Let him know! Did you just sin? Yeah, he saw it, and he is not mad about it, but he does want to talk to you about it. Did you see something beautiful or experience something joyful? Thanks him! Are there needs and concerns? Ask him for advice or help.

What is prayer? It is simply talking to God in a normal way, just as we talk to anybody else.

What this means it that if you are asking “What is prayer?” you don’t really need to read books on prayer. You don’t need to be taught how to pray. You don’t need to attend prayer training seminars. You don’t need to learn a prayer language. You don’t need to memorize lots of Scripture in order to pray. If you know how to talk, you can pray! Just imagine God sitting next to you, and talk to him as you would talk to anyone else!

Do you want to pray like never before?

Do you what to talk to God like you talk to a friend? Do you want to see more answers to prayer?

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Practical Alternatives to Prayer Meetings

By Jeremy Myers

5 Comments

After we recognize the problems of prayer meetings, we can start taking practical steps to help people better understand what prayer is, how to pray, and how to become answers to our own prayers.

Cancel Prayer Meetings

You may want to cancel all your church prayer meetings, or at least the regularly-scheduled prayer meetings.

There is nothing wrong with having a time of corporate prayer on an occasional basis in response to a deep need or issue that is facing the entire congregation. But a regularly scheduled prayer meeting is most often unhealthy for the life of the church, and leads to many of the problems mentioned in previous posts. So cancel it.

But this does not mean we cancel prayer. Not at all!

Don’t Cancel Prayer

With some targeted teaching on prayer, and modeling of a healthy prayer life, pastors and church leaders can actually unleash the power of prayer within their congregation.

Rather than meet simply to pray, meet to go serve the community, and before you go, spend a few minutes in prayer for eyes to see and ears to hear the needs and issues that people in the neighborhood are dealing with.

Then remind the people that as they serve others, to maintain that prayerful communication with God to listen for what He might be leading His children to say and do. This sort of prayer can set a church on fire!

This is the active prayer life of the church.

This is the prayer of faith that moves mountains, feeds the multitudes, cleans up the city, and reaches thousands for Christ.

As a church moves out into the community with prayers of faith and acts of service, the true power of prayer is unleashed within the community of believers, and they begin to see prayer for what it is and how it works.

Let prayer meetings cease, not because prayer is unimportant, but because it is too important to be held hostage in a back room of the church building.

Do you want to pray like never before?

Do you what to talk to God like you talk to a friend? Do you want to see more answers to prayer?

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Why you should try Praying the Psalms

By Jeremy Myers

5 Comments

In previous posts, we have seen that both the prayers of Jesus and the prayers of Paul were conversational prayers with God. They talked to God about the same sorts of things they would talk to anyone else about, and used the same sort of language. The book of Psalms reflects something similar about prayer. When we pray the Psalms, we learn to pray to God in a way that sounds like we are talking to anyone else.

The Psalms as Prayers

The Psalms are not exactly prayers. They are actually songs that were intended to be sung. But they are not just songs, either. They were intended to be sung when Israel worshiped God in the temple and during their annual festivals. As such, it is safe to think of the Psalms as prayers to God that are sung.

And the great thing about the Psalms is that they reflect the full range of human emotions. If you are feeling something … there’s a Psalm you can use to pray about it.

Most of the Psalms are about giving praise and honor God, and calling on the people to faithfully love and serve Him, but sometimes the Psalmist is angry with God, and tells Him so (Psalms 10:1; 22:1; 42:9; 74:1, 11). Other times the Psalmist is angry and people, and tells God about this too, to the point of asking God to destroy his enemies (Psalms 54:5; 79:10; 143:12). Sometimes the Psalms are quite long (Psalm 119). Sometimes short (Psalm 117). Sometimes they use repetition (Psalm 136). Sometimes they focus on simply praising God (Psalm 150), while others focusing on His past works (Psalm 78).

Walter Brueggemann, in his excellent little book, Praying the Psalms, says that the Psalms are not the voice of God addressing us, but rather contain the voice of a common humanity addressing God (p. 1). When you pray the Psalms, you are praying together with believers throughout the world and throughout time.

Conversations with God

When people wonder what sorts of things they can and should pray about, and what kind of language and words to use when communicating with God, it is often not enough to just tell them that they can have a conversation with God just like with any other person. For some, this seems too informal.

So it is often always a good idea to also recommend the Book of Psalms a helpful guide to learning how to pray and what to pray for. As people pray through the Psalms, they learn that pretty much anything can be said to God, and any emotion is welcome by Him. There are no taboo topics or emotions.

Again, from Walter Brueggemann: “The Psalter knows that life is dislocated. No cover-up is necessary” (Praying the Psalms, p. 9).

But this is just like our real relationships in life, right? Your genuine relationships, your meaningful friendships, are the ones where you interact with each other with honesty and reality. You share your emotions, feelings, and ideas without fear of being judged. Where you do not have this freedom to be real, you do not have a real friendship.

So why do we so often hold back in our prayers? We should not and we must not, if we desire true friendship with God. When we pray the Psalms, we learn to express all our feelings and emotions to God, just as we do with any true friend.

But this is just like life, isn’t it? Our conversations with others cover the whole spectrum of emotions and subjects. Sometimes we are careful with our words and ideas. Other times we don’t hold back.

Just like the prayers of Jesus and the prayers of Paul, praying the Psalms helps us see that prayer is an ongoing and open conversation with God.

All of this, I think, helps us understand what Paul meant when He instructed the Thessalonian believers to “Pray without ceasing.”.

What about praying the Scriptures?

Do you want to pray like never before?

Do you what to talk to God like you talk to a friend? Do you want to see more answers to prayer?

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Watch out! The Lord’s Prayer will ruin your life

The Lord’s Prayer is full of dangerous prayers which can destroy your life.

Hallowed be thy name

Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven

Give us this day our daily bread

And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgiven those who trespass against us

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil

The Lord’s Prayer is Dangerous

Do you want to pray like never before?

The 8 Most Dangerous Christian Prayers… #5 Ruined my Life

1. Teach me humility.

2. Teach me patience.

3. Lead me wherever you want me to go.

4. Help me understand the plight of the poor.

5. Make me more like Jesus.

6. Give me more faith.

7. Give me victory over sin and temptation.

8. Please help my annoying neighbor/coworker come to Christ.

What Dangerous Christian Prayers have you prayed?

Do you want to pray like never before?

What is Prayer?

What is prayer?

Do you want to pray like never before?

Practical Alternatives to Prayer Meetings

Cancel Prayer Meetings

Don’t Cancel Prayer

Do you want to pray like never before?

Why you should try Praying the Psalms

The Psalms as Prayers

Conversations with God

Do you want to pray like never before?

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