A Daily Habit of Prayer

Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still.

–Psalm 4:4

How can you develop a praying heart? Yesterday, we looked at two practical ways to cultivate a powerful prayer life: First, don’t complicate prayer. Keep your prayers simple and sincere. Second, write out your prayers. Composing your prayers helps you focus.

Third, start and end your day with prayer. When I was young, my accordion teacher told me something I’ve never forgotten. He said, “As long as you get the first note right and the last note right, everything in between is pure fluff.” That advice applies to our days as well. How you begin and end the day determines how everything in between goes. The Bible encourages us to begin each day with prayer. In Psalm 5:3, David said, “In the morning, O Lord, You will hear my voice; in the morning I will order my prayer to You and eagerly watch.” But notice that David also ended his day in prayer. In Psalm 4:4–5, David said, “Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still. Offer the sacrifices of righteousness, and trust in the Lord.” Isn’t that a great thought? Your bed can be an altar from which you offer sacrifices of righteousness to God.

How you begin the day and how you end the day determines how you spend the rest of the day. In the morning before your feet hit the ground, take a few moments to talk to your heavenly Father. Ask Him for His favor throughout the day. Ask for protection for your family. Ask for wisdom in the decisions you make. And before you drift off to sleep at night, make your final thoughts a prayer to God, reviewing the day with Him, confessing anything you wish you had done differently, and asking for His protection through the night.

Finally, redeem those random moments in your life. If you’re like me, you go from one activity to another throughout the day, but there is some in-between time as you’re driving or waiting for the next scheduled thing. Instead of frittering away that time scrolling through your phone or listening to the mindless chatter of talk radio, use those random moments to talk to your heavenly Father. You’ll find the more that you pray, the more you’ll want to pray.

I read about a Hollywood actress who went to a gala and fainted on the red carpet. When she was revived, she smiled and said, “I forgot to breathe.” Sound ridiculous? No more so than forgetting to pray. Prayer is like breathing. Regular prayer is essential in our lives.

Today’s devotion is adapted from “Developing a Praying Heart” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2008.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org.