What does it mean to pray? Everyone has their own interpretation of prayer. But what is prayer according to the Bible and according to our experience as believers? I think as believers we know the importance of individual prayer as a time between us and the Lord, which many times involves repentance, confession, genuine and intimate conversation, etc. But even more, prayer to a believer is spiritual breathing—it’s our contacting and mingling with the Lord through our spirit, our innermost part.
As believers, we need to have a personal prayer life with the Lord, but what about corporate prayer or prayer among two or more believers (Matt. 18:20)? How can people who are so different in their background, experience, maturity level, etc. come together with other believers and pray? Pray for what? The Lord’s desire. How? By the inner sense of the inner life.
The Lord in us gives us an inner sense. It is this sense that we are to learn to follow and live by for the rest of our Christian life on this earth. Sometimes the sense can’t be uttered, but we know we have a sense. We may sense a heavy weight or burden inside of us, yet we can only pray as the Spirit intercedes for us (Romans 8:26-27).
Last week, I had an experience with a sister whom I fellowship with via phone every week (due to the pandemic). We have no set agenda; each week our time together is different. We share about our life, our recent enjoyment; we sing, we pray. Last week, I had a sense in me that we needed to pray that night and specifically about two people who were on my heart.
As soon as I got on the phone with this sister, I shared with her about a student I would be precepting at work throughout the summer. Immediately after my sharing, we both felt we needed to pray for her. This sister confirmed in me the sense to pray when she said, “Tonight, let’s use this time to pray. Let’s pray for this brother and that sister and for the upcoming camping trip.” When she mentioned the names of the brother and sister, I immediately knew it was the Lord. There was no prior conversation on this topic; we simply both had the same inner sense to use our time together to pray and to pray specifically for certain ones.
We prayed together in one accord and afterward we felt our burden was released. The inner life inside of us felt right and satisfied. We knew the Lord heard us and we knew the Lord was satisfied with our prayer to Him.
So why did we feel released inside? I remember years ago, when I first entered the church life, I was fortunate enough to go through some sections of a book called The Prayer Ministry of the Church by brother Watchman Nee. What made the deepest impression on me was that the Lord can do anything, but He wants to do everything through man, so He needs man to pray on the earth. He needs man to lay down the tracks for Him so that He has a way to move on the earth. Without our prayers laying down the tracks, He won’t have a way to move on the earth—to accomplish what He wants. When we pray according to the inner sense inside of us, which is according to the Lord’s desire, then whatever we bind on the earth shall have been bound in the heavens, and whatever we loose on the earth shall be loosed in the heavens (Matt. 16:19).
That night, I believe, through the prayer with my sister, tracks were laid on the earth for our dear Lord, for Him to carry out what He wants. What a satisfaction to pray by the inner sense. May we pursue this real prayer with each other to satisfy our Lord and fulfill the true meaning and purpose of prayer.
– LU