Why Pray

We pray because God invites and directs us to pray to him (Matthew 7:7; Luke 18:1; Ephesians 6:18; 1 Thessalonians 5:17).  We pray because God promises that he will hear and answer our prayers (Psalm 50:15; 91:15; John 15:7).  We pray because God tells us that prayer is “powerful and effective” (James 5:16).  That same section of James illustrates how God acted on Elijah’s prayers.  We have many reasons to pray to our God.

Your question addresses the kinds of prayers that we call “petitions,” prayers in which we make requests of God.  You know that we utilize prayer for other reasons though.  We pray to God to give thanks to him.  We pray to God to communicate, among other things, our thoughts, our fears, and our concerns.  Prayer is finally communication with God.  As we communicate with other people daily on a variety of issues and subjects, so we have opportunity to converse with God about the issues of life—and to do that daily.

We may not understand all the mysteries of God’s will, but this part of his will we do know:  he wants us to employ the privilege of prayer.  God speaks to us through his Word, and through prayer he makes it possible for us to speak to him.  He wants us to pray, and he delights in our prayers.  “The prayer of the upright pleases him [God]” (Proverbs 15:8).