Inviting God in through prayer journaling
Prayer turns the tables on the enemy
Studies have shown that journaling helps improve your mood by helping you prioritize problems, fears, and concerns. Journaling opens up the mind and helps regulate our emotions for a greater sense of confidence and self-identity. It’s proven that if a person spends 15-20 minutes journaling a day, he or she can lower their blood pressure and have a greater sense of purpose and happiness.
As I started to write down both my joys and fears, I realized that I could turn my journal into something more specific: a way to talk to God and express myself to Him fully. Over time, prayer journaling became my selfdiscipline and time with God.
I open up my prayer journal and just start writing. Every time, I am amazed at what flows out from my being. As I write I express both my anxieties and my thankfulness. It helps me to reflect on God’s goodness and what I still hope for. The fun part is going back and reading what I wrote weeks or years ago and seeing God’s hands have been woven in everything.
When I was younger, it was a struggle to pray. I believed God knew my heart and that I could talk to Him about anything, but sitting and expressing my prayers out loud wasn’t enough for me. It didn’t feel real.
Praying to God can be a struggle for many people. Yet, you and I have the amazing opportunity to journey with Him every single day. This requires each of us to develop ways of communicating with God and making Him part of our daily lives.
God is an amazing Father who stays with us always, even if we forget to pray. That’s beautiful! However, our lives can be enriched if we learned to pray without ceasing. A dear friend once said, “Sometimes we won’t be motivated to read our Bible or to pray, but it’s the self-discipline behind the motivation that will get us to put prayer into action.” She was right. The best part about prayer journaling is that when I make it a routine to prayer journal every morning, it helps me then pray with my heart, mouth, and mind throughout the rest of my day. It was the key that unlocked asking God to journey with me through every step of my day. Prayer wasn’t meant to be a one-time thing, but an everlasting refreshment that helps guide us through every part of our lives.
You don’t need to be concerned with grammar or spelling mistakes. Just open your journal and start writing. Keep writing even if you don’t have a specific point—as you continue to write, things will naturally flow out. Remember, God knows your heart and the deepest part of your being, but He still wants to be invited in.
Prayer was meant to be an everlasting refreshment that guides us through every part of our lives.
Growing up in a Christian home meant that for me prayer was everywhere. We prayed for our food. We thanked God for the blessings in our lives. We prayed for what we wanted to happen. We prayed for clarity. We prayed for forgiveness. We prayed for protection.
But until I got older, I never really understood using prayer as a weapon. It is a weapon to fight to get in line with God’s will and participate in the advance of His Kingdom. The Bible is full of verses describing how God has blessings galore to lavish on us. But how often do we really feel those blessings?
Do we live our lives surrounded by a peace that passes understanding? Do we feel the power to overcome anger in our most stressful times? Do we live like we are on the winning team? Or do we always feel like we’re playing defence?
To me, prayer is how a Christian can play an offensive role in advancing God’s Kingdom. You can go out and tell people about the Word of God, but if it is not protected, those seeds will fall on dry ground. You can pray with someone, but without the eye-opening powers of Christ, will they even hear it? Prayer is what tips the scales from being a Christian who plays defence to one who plays offence. It’s what makes us remember we are on a winning team. It’s what makes us feel we are moving forward more than we’re going backward.
Satan is a real enemy. He is not one to be ignored, although he would love it if you did. Instead, let’s invite God’s power to fight against his thwarting plans. Who do you think creates dissension in your home? Who makes you feel so alone that you call or text people you shouldn’t? Who makes you feel like a failure on a daily basis? Satan. The best part is we know God has already won the battle. We know what happens in the end. It is quite laughable, really, that
Satan thinks he even has a chance with us if we are with Christ. He is the one who should be treading water, not us. The power Jesus Christ can work through us is unlimited. Don’t ever feel you aren’t a strong enough Christian to fight off attacks. If you think along that route you will never be strong enough; all you need to do is trust Christ because He is strong enough, even though you’re not.
Speak the words out loud. “In the name of Jesus Christ, let this fear be gone,” whether it’s negative thought patterns, procrastination, money worries, etc. Then trust and wait, for “The one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).
The power of offensive prayer has saved my life more than once. Refusing to let yourself become a victim is the first—and often the hardest—step to overcome. You first need to accept that you are worth fighting for. Decide to believe God created you for freedom in Him, not for slithering on your belly.
Hard times will still come, but amid your hard times, you can have peace in your heart. You can trust God to carry you through. Every hard time you encounter can help you reach the lost—the more you go through, the more people you will understand, the more your empathy builds. Your prayers for others can become more powerful and precise.
Trust God. Trust that prayer works. Trust that He knows the best timing and way to answer your prayers. You do your part and He will do His.
Prayer is what makes us feel we are moving forward more than we’re going backward.
When I was younger, I didn’t recognize my strong tendency to be driven. To be dedicated and determined are great qualities, but to be driven can lead to a narrow, selfish vision. I could have asked God for help with my driven nature, but I didn’t. Because of this, I missed out on how to be a friend, how to serve others, and how to honour my parents.
In part, I was in survival mode due to my dysfunctional home life, and there is grace for that. In part, I was consumed with myself and my future. There is grace for that too. There can be deep-seated reasons for our behaviours, which makes it all the more important to talk to God about them.
I encourage you to remember He will “restore the years the locust have eaten” (Joel 2:25). Just like a plague of locusts can lay waste to the land, my selfishness laid waste to the years of my youth. By identifying and acknowledging my selfishness before God, sincerely and honestly, I was restored. My future with God, moving forward, outweighs all that I lost.
As I continued to search for meaning and purpose in life, I became drawn to the honesty of prayer in the book of Psalms. In Psalm 51 David tells the Lord, “…you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge. Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.” In the same chapter, he cries, “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.”
These verses encouraged me to speak the same words and my own thoughts, concerns, and gratitude to God. Through David’s honesty I got a clear picture of God’s holiness and how I should approach Him in prayer. Through David’s failures and penitent heart, I learned I could continue to talk to God even with my terrible track record. I dealt with a great deal of anxiety growing up. I was afraid because of what I saw happen in my home and afraid of who I might become. After I left home, I had trouble identifying my anxiety. I was no longer in the same volatile situations, but I wasn’t talking to God much anymore either.
After I made the decision to trust God, I began to mature in my faith relationship with Him. Only then could I see through the Holy Spirit’s guidance in our conversation together. I can relate to the old song, “I Need Thee Every Hour.” All I needed to do was open my lips and call on Him. I realized that much of the anxiety, restlessness, and uneasiness I felt was simply my soul longing for communion with Him.
Through David’s honesty I got a clear picture of God’s holiness and how I should approach Him in prayer.