Relating Prayer to a Sport

Introduction to the Sport of Prayer – Part 1

The Sport of Prayer – Part 1.1

This concept sounds strange because it’s unheard of. You’ll understand it better when we compare prayer to the sport of football. Since prayer is so diverse and what I mean by that is, if Adam spoke with God (prayed) and Moses spoke with God (prayed), they didn’t do it the same. It’s like players on a football team. You have running backs, receivers, defensive backs, etc. Each player has a different gifting therefore their functions are different. Prayer is the same way, but in this section we talk more about training for prayer, exercise regimen, and game day for pray-ers. In other words, we discuss the work you must put into becoming a next-level pray-er.

In this introduction, my goal is to start formulating thoughts in your mind of the different components to consider when we talk about prayer in general. The best way for me to describe it is to compare prayer to a sport like football.

What do we know about a sport?
To do this properly we must first identify the elements of a sport. What do we know about any sport?

• Sports require the players to utilize their skills.
  In order to go to the next-level in prayer, one must continually sharpen her or his skills. You see, for some odd reason, Christians think that once they’ve become a Christian that’s it. Being a next-level person which is the definition of being a Christian, we are continually growing. Scripture reveals that we are like a tree planted on a river bank that is growing larger, stronger and more healthy like an athlete. ^[1]

   

• There is an element of competition to the game being played.
  In the sport of prayer, we must consider the competition we might encounter. Like in football, there is always an opponent who is trying to keep you from or slowing you down from reaching the goal. Prayer isn’t much different; there are elements that try to stand in your way of reaching your goal.

   

• The game not only brings adversity, but pleasure.
  In the sport of prayer, most players who don’t know how to play the game (for lack of better words) experience adversity and defeat more often than the joy and pleasure of victory. The goal of this message is to show you how prayer for next-level pray-ers brings more victories than defeats and thus pleasure. In His presence there is nothing but pleasure. ^[2]

   

• Every sport has rules to how the game is played.
  This element of a sport is simple. The game has rules. Like in football, a team gets only 4-downs until the ball must be given to the opponent or you gain the necessary yardage to get a new set of downs. You get only 4-downs. Prayer is similar in that there are rules to how it’s done. There are rules that aren’t always considered which limits an individual’s ability to play. Your knowledge of the rules directly correlates to the results you get when playing the game.

   

• Every sport has a field of play.
  In football there are boundaries and at times when you cross those lines, you’re out of bounds and disqualified. In prayer, there are boundaries and a field of play that must be considered if you want to improve in the sport. Have you considered the field of play when you pray?

I thought I’d get much further into this introduction into the sport of prayer, but I’m learning not to give too much at any given time for the sake of time and the length of each web-post (installment). Above I’ve given you the idea of paralleling prayer to a sport like football, what I have left to give in this introduction is what it takes to prepare for the game. Join us next week. Until then, I leave you with this question.

Question: what sport elements have I overlooked that can be used to explain the sport of prayer?

Reference #1: Psalms 1:3 NKJV‬‬‬‬, Bible.com, accessed January 4, 2022, https://www.bible.com/bible/114/PSA.1.3.NKJV

Reference #2: Psalms 16:11 NKJV‬‬‬‬, Bible.com, accessed January 4, 2022, https://www.bible.com/bible/114/PSA.16.11.NKJV

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