What To Pray

There is plenty of direction in Scripture that can serve to remind us about the importance of prayer, as well as what we should pray for. Romans 8 identifies that we will encounter times in which we don't know what to pray, but we can rely on God's faithful provision. It states:
26 Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
27 Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.
28 And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.

And, there's this powerful passage from James 5:
16 Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain; and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.
18 And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit.

We can rely on God's direction in our prayers.  A recent CBN.com article related that the daughter of Anne Graham Lotz, who is heard on Living in the Light, Sunday evenings at 6:30, had a powerful experience with that.  The story relates:

She didn't know all the details, but the Lord led her to pray for an English-speaking man to come up to the Doyle brothers and pull them out of the dangerous area they were in. And God answered her prayer exactly as she had prayed it.

The Doyle brothers are Josh and Tommy Doyle - their parents are Tom and JoAnn Doyle of the ministry, Uncharted, who have been guests on The Meeting House program.  Josh hosts a podcast called, No Longer Nomads.  Rachel Ruth Lotz Wright was a guest recently.  As CBN shares:

...they recalled together a precise answer to one of her prayers and how it literally saved Doyle's life several years ago.

It took place when brothers Josh and Tommy Doyle were serving as missionaries in Turkey and got lost. They suddenly found themselves at great risk of being captured and killed by ISIS.

"As we go deeper into the market, we see more faces popping out that are ISIS fighters," Josh recalled. "At this point, I would say that we were starting to have a panic attack."

"No one spoke English, anywhere we went, asking for help from shopkeepers," he said. "We felt like we were truly in the lion's den."

The story goes on:

The Doyles put out an urgent request for prayer, and halfway around the world Rachel Ruth got the message and prayed specifically that God would send an English-speaking translator immediately to help the Doyle brothers escape to safety.

That's exactly what happened next.

Doyle explained, "All of a sudden, out of a sea of people, some guy comes directly up to us and speaks perfect English. And he goes, 'Are you guys lost?'"

The man then guided them to safety.

Rachel Ruth said: "This is crazy... just to show y'all who are listening how unbelievable the Holy Spirit is," adding, "All those years ago, I was a stay-at-home mom... and I get a text from Josh's mom, and she said 'pray because they're surrounded by ISIS.'"

It occurred to me that we may be called into dangerous places.  Danger may mean to go into or live in a part of the world that is hostile toward Christianity.  And, those who do so don't face these challenges alone - there is the prayer of believers, there are angelic companions, and most of all, there is the presence of the Holy Spirit who goes with believers who desire to follow Christ. 

But, danger might have a different meaning: we may be called to leave our comfort zone, essentially to stare down what we fear.  Because we live in a state of spiritual warfare, with forces aligned with the devil who want to take us out - to follow the enemy's mission to, as Jesus said, steal, kill, and destroy.  That's a real danger: spiritually speaking, and there may even be manifestations in the physical or emotional realms. But, we can be confident in the Lord.

And, we can be confident in Him, to depend on Him to show us how to pray.  While I think it is important to pray specifically, sometimes we may not have the complete knowledge of a situation, but we can rely on the Spirit to take our words and direct them, so that the will of God will be fulfilled.  We don't have to be uninformed or insecure in our prayers - we can rely on God's strength.