How to Build Your Prayer Time?

Building Your Prayer Time – Part 1

What Manner of Prayer is This? – Part 5.1

Have you ever considered that your time to speak with God can be exciting, one that you look forward to having? If this is not the way you feel when you go before the CEO of your life, then you can stand to take it to the next level. There’s no rule that says you can’t have a strategy for your prayer time. Create a plan for how you’d like your time of prayer to look.

Whenever I pray, I like to think of the outcome I am interested in having. In other words, I consider the time I have and build out what all I can accomplish during this time to achieve the outcome I desire. What I mean by achieving the desired outcome is this; know what I need to cover or speak with God about during the time I have. I plan to enjoy the experience and set up the environment and exercise so that I enjoy it. I know that might sound a little strange and it should because it’s uncommon. Before you go into prayer, set a plan, and build out the time so that it brings joy. “In His presence is joy…” [1] In this way you look forward to repeating the exercise daily.

In what ways, can you build your prayer time?
Keep in mind this should be your highest priority for the day, prayer that is. When you start to see the results that come when you take prayer to the next level, you’ll soon stop skipping opportunities to pray. You will begin to establish appointed times to get it in. Allow us to provide you with ideas on how to build out your time.

  1. Set An Appointment for Prayer.
    When you treat your time to pray like you have an appointment or meeting with God, you’ll design it so that you are prepared. Here’s what we suggest. Create a list of topics to include in some shape, form, or fashion, during your daily prayer appointment. Let me pause there and define what we mean by prayer appointment.
    Michael Hyatt, author, speaker, and mentor, often says that “if it is not scheduled, it doesn’t get done.” If prayer is not scheduled, then it won’t get done. Pamela and I have a designated time and have placed appointments on our calendars for prayer every single day. In fact, it’s based on how we prepare for leaving our home for the day. It’s like brushing your teeth. You don’t want to leave your home without brushing your teeth first or washing your face. That’s how seriously we take our prayer appointment. We are not going to leave until we have asked God to surround us today with his favor, like a shield. There are just some things that we don’t want to leave home without and the number one thing is to have our time of prayer.

    When you understand prayer the way we do (next level), then you will be excited about the next time, the next opportunity you have to get to this appointment. It’s not like going to the dentist where you dread having work done to your mouth. It’s not like going to the doctor or what not. This is like having a scheduled time where you’re going to do the most exciting activity of your day. We intentionally do our best to make this the most enjoyable moment of our day. Build out your prayer time. This is next level prayer.

     

  2. Bring Any Tools You May Need for Your Prayer Appointment.
    Like any appointment, there are certain tools needed such as pen, paper, maybe a computer, etc. One of the tools we have is what we call our prayer focuses for the year. It gives us a guide to the things that we want to cover (in prayer) throughout our days. The prayer focuses serves like a table of contents for our time in prayer. We pray in this manner, so to speak.
    The prayer focuses are topics we want to make sure we cover without fail. Therefore each day we get to a different section and then when we get to the end, we just start over again. Keep in mind by the time you start over again, there are different updates on what’s happening in our lives. Remember, prayer in this way is you bringing your life, which is your business, before the one who owns the business. It is you giving Him all the updates for everything you have going on.

    The apostle Paul says it this way, “God knows how often I pray for you. Day and night…” [2] This implies, he prays often, “I bring you and your needs in prayer to God.” [2] This is what we’re doing in our prayer time. How can we be like the apostle Paul in that we can say…if you only knew how often that we pray? If you only knew we were praying day and night on a schedule, on a routine. If you knew all the needs and things that we were covering, you would understand that prayer is something totally different than what you’ve been doing. It’s not boring. It’s not mundane. It’s actually exciting. Here’s why. Based on this idea, prayer is like sowing seeds to produce a harvest, a specific harvest.

    What are you expecting to come up out of the ground when you pray? Have you prayed enough with the intention that you planted seeds that you’re tracking? Prayer is your ability to track seeds that you’re sowing, that you’ve given up to God, that you’re planting in a field, a spiritual field so to speak. And the more you pray, the more you have planted. The more you have planted, the more you harvest, meaning, the more results you get. You see, prayer is about results. “Day and night I bring you and your needs in prayer to God,” [2] so that God can do something about it. I may not be able to do anything about it, but God can. Therefore, I’m planting seeds, seeds about everything. The scripture says you can pray about everything. [3] Build out your prayer time using your favorite tools to make it enjoyable. This is next level prayer.

     

  3. Prepare to Pray for Everything.
    Actually, you should pray about everything. What’s everything? There’s nothing not included in everything. You pray about everything. Try to make a list of everything and pray about it. And what do I mean by everything? Just start, how long would you think it would take you to write down everything? How about everything in your home? Start with every room in your home. Every person on your job. Everyone that you serve on that ministry team. Everything that you have, your co-workers, all of your friends, every relationship you have. How long would it take you to write that out? Can you pray over it so you can see a harvest?

    You see, we pray for our friends. One particular example is that one of our friends has a ministry, he calls it a brand, where he is serving young guys who don’t have a father figure in the home. So we are constantly praying over his brand. We are constantly praying over his mentoring of those young guys who are missing what he once missed. We’re praying over his success and making sure the doors are opening so that He get the opportunity to do more, take this brand to the next level. We stay close so we can pray specifically. He has guys that he knows by name and we have to pray for him by name. He’ll tell me about their parents or what’s happening. What’s keeping them from being able to come to the program? So, we’ll pray specifically. Our friend is seeing positive results regularly. These results came out of prayer. Build out your prayer time so that you can pray for everything. This is next level prayer.

Figure out how you’d like to build out your time for prayer so that you look forward to it. The key is to find a way for you to enjoy it so that you look forward to doing it. Find a way to make having a repeatable time of prayer attractive for you. What would your life be like if you took prayer to the next level in this way? What if you set an appointment to pray? What if you used the tools you like during your prayer appointment? What if you were prepared to pray for everything? This is how you build out your prayer time for praying in a manner that you enjoy. This is next level prayer.

Question: What would your life be like if you took the time to build out your prayer time in a way that you’d enjoy it?

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[1] ‭‭Psalms 16:11 NKJV‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬, Bible.com, accessed September 21, 2022, https://www.bible.com/bible/114/PSA.16.11.NKJV
[2] ‭‭Romans 1:9 NLT‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬, Bible.com, accessed September 21, 2022, https://www.bible.com/bible/116/ROM.1.9.NLT
[3] ‭‭Philippians 4:6 NLT‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬, Bible.com, accessed September 21, 2022, https://www.bible.com/bible/116/PHP.4.6.NLT

All Scripture references used by permission, see our Scripture copyrights.

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