Have you ever struggled with knowing how to pray, and what to pray? If you have, then you’re in good company – Jesus’ own disciples wanted to learn from Him how to pray as they saw the power of prayer in His life (Luke 11:1). Jesus then taught His disciples a prayer construct that we know as “The Lord’s Prayer”. This was to be a framework for their private prayer lives (Matthew 6:6), yet it also gives us the best platform from which to lead others in prayer. So if we are going to learn how to pray as we lead worship, then we should take our cues from Jesus.
So let’s get straight into it and learn from Jesus how we should and can pray.
- Firstly, Jesus warned us not to make a “show” of our praying (Read Matthew 6: 5ff). For us as leaders of worship, that means..
- We don’t put on a particular voice and try and sound like anyone other than ourselves.
- We don’t use long theological words that only a few might understand, (and, strangely, most worship leaders struggle to explain!)
- We don’t pray to the crowd but to our heavenly Father.
- We do use simple, everyday language that is instantly accessible, real and personal. So don’t be someone else, be yourself.
- Secondly, pray to your Heavenly Father (Matthew 6:9). I’ve always felt it helpful to first acknowledge my God as my Father, and then to imagine myself in His presence, speaking as a child speaks to their daddy – open, honest, real and appropriately raw. That helps me speak from the heart, and to use words that are more conversational, and less … shall we say… “theatrical”.
- Thirdly, whilst we do pray to our Heavenly Father, we must be acutely aware of others. The role we have is to pray on behalf of others – in essence – for them. It’s an awesome privilege and responsibility. Jesus was aware of this. At Lazarus’ graveside he said… “I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.” (John 11:42 NIV) Jesus’ main concern was for people to believe in Him. We always need to pray with the awareness that others need to say “Amen” to our prayers – in other words – “…we agree that what you are saying are true”. So pray truth.
- Fourthly, you may find yourself praying prophetically as the Spirit moves – that is, praying words from the heart of God over the people. This always comes in the form of a blessing & encouragement. More on this in another blog.
- Finally, be aware of the context of where you pray in the worship service. The Lord’s Prayer begins with worship and moves through confession and forgiveness, asking for provision, protection and so on. Make sure your prayers connect with the context of the service or at least segue from one aspect to another. For example, you may have just been singing songs of praise and exaltation, and you may segue from that context into prayerful confession and then into thanksgiving or a song that speaks of God’s grace. Hopefully you get the picture.
A daunting thought is that when we pray, we are teaching the people who are part of our community, how to pray. You may feel under equipped for that, or that it’s not your role to do that, but be that as it may, you still are modelling how to pray. So it is proper that we, as worship leaders, take this part of worship very seriously. So… be led by the Spirit as well as plan in our prayers, and be willing to change in a breath.
Have I missed anything… I’m sure I have. Please feed into these thoughts, and share them with those who pray each week out the front.
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