Hello, everyone! It's BananaPieLove! As an admin (well, the only one), I was asked to do a chapter in this book! With a bit (a lot) help from the guy who started this wonderful ministry, I've decided to do it over prayer and how to pray! My apologies, as I might not do things quite like they are usually done here, but I pray that you guys still enjoy and take something from this! :)

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What is prayer?

Answer:

Prayer is a Christian's connection to God through Jesus Christ. It is a part of our relationship with God, therefore it should be a significant piece of our lives daily.

You may have heard before that praying is just talking to God. Well, no. It is talking to Jesus. The Bible reminds us several times that Jesus is the only way to get to the Father, so in our prayers we need to make it known that we are speaking and crying out to Jesus. This also, if your prayers are spoken out loud, allows others around you to know who you are praying to, who you stand for, and when the prayer is answered, they'll know where the answer came from and that GOD is the one who blessed and helped you when you cried out.

The Bible also tells us that we never pray alone. Not only are we praying to Jesus, but he is praying with us and for us:

"Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died — more than that, who was raised — who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us."
-Romans 8:34

How do I pray?

Answer:

Really, there is no technical answer for this. Everyone prays differently. There is no "right" way to pray. But no matter how you do it, whether it be out loud, through song, in your mind, or simply just crying to Him, Jesus is going to hear your call and help you in the way that is best for you! Just say what is on your heart and mind at the moment!

If you have never prayed before, it's quite simple! You can start by saying the Lord's Prayer which is given to us in the book of Matthew:

"This, then, is how you should pray:
"'Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.'"
-Matthew 6:9-13

But know that this prayer is not the exact words we should say as we pray. God doesn't really want us to go quoting Scripture to Him! He wants us to talk personally to him, one on one, heart to heart. The Lord's Prayer is only a guideline to what our prayers should consist of. Usually, it is taught to younger children or new Christians to help them understand how to pray and to lay that foundation for them for when they are old enough to take the matter into their own hands and can add in their own requests and praise.

Here's a great acronym that goes along with the Lord's Prayer to help you out! (I used this in one of my own books and it fits so perfectly in with this topic, so I decided to use it for this!)

P - Praise ("Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be thy name...")
1. Your own words of praise, what he has done for you
2. Pray scriptures of praise (If you choose to, but like I said, God doesn't just want you to go quoting to Him. He's heard those before. He wants to hear from YOU.)

R - Requests ("Your kingdom come, your will be done...")
1. Requests that are God's will
2. Personal requests

A - Admit ("Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors...")
1. Confess mistakes
2. Forgive others

Y - Yield ("Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one...")
1. Surrender your life to follow God

Also, "Amen" means so be it — an expression of agreement or approval. By closing your prayer with this single word, you are basically wrapping up everything you said in full belief that God will help you and that you accept whatever He has in store for you. To me personally, it adds a bit of sincerity to my prayer, but of course that is different for each individual.

Through your prayers remember this: God may not always give you exactly what you want, exactly when you want it. BUT He will give you everything you need, right when you need it.

"This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us — whatever we ask — we know that we have what we asked of him."
-1 John 5:14-15

•••God will if it's God's will!•••

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Thank you so much for taking the time to read this, and I so dearly hope you learned something from it and then take whatever you learned and place it in your heart to keep.

I am known for doing little "pep talks" at the end of all my chapters, and I can't not do it just because this isn't technically my book! So here we go:
I believe that each and every one of you were made to do something great! Not only that, but to BE something great! God created each of you with your own individual features and talents, and He did that for a reason! So why waste it all? Go out there and use what God so carefully chose to give you! He blessed me with a voice, and you better be sure I'm gonna use it! So with this new year at hand, I challenge you to make this year better than the last and to use every inch of your incredible, God given talents to do great things, all to His glory! You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great!

•God is good, all the time.
All the time, God is good!•

Thank you, once again!
God bless you all! You deserve it! :)

•BPL