How often do you only pray for things that seem realistic? Maybe you wish you had more opportunities at work, or less conflict in your relationships, when in reality you could use more of God’s help. Some prayer requests are small compared to the great God you are speaking to in prayer. God is much more powerful than those who give small blessings every now and then. The great truth is that God has infinite love and power. God answers small prayers, but He also answers prayers much bigger than you can imagine. So why limit yourself to praying only small prayers? It’s time to stop praying small and start praying big and expanding your faith, even when it seems impossible. As you pray louder, you will find God sending you louder answers and your faith will grow in the process.
1. Expect the best, not the minimum: If you don’t expect much from God, you might just say a small prayer. You need to adjust your expectations to the reality of how God wants the best for you. Expecting the best from God makes our prayers deeper and requires our faith to grow alongside our prayers. Consider why you are limiting your expectations of what God can and will do. Maybe you’ve been disappointed before. Or maybe you’re asking God for the bare minimum of what you want because you feel worthless. But your Heavenly Father, who loves you, does not want you to survive. He wants you to grow. God is generous and wants to bless you abundantly. The Bible says in James 1:17: “Every good and perfect gift comes from above, coming down from the Father of heavenly lights, who is as unchanging as a shifting shadow.” When you pray, try to change your focus from expecting God to give you at least something to what God can offer you, that is, what is best for you. Think about what is the best scenario for your situation, not just the minimum amount of help you need. Are you encouraging your children to excel in school? Pray for them to develop a lifelong love of learning to discover God’s wisdom and guide them to bring God’s best into their futures. Are you just looking for relief from temporary financial hardship? You can pray bigger by praying for breakthroughs that will increase your income in the long term, help you live debt-free, and give generously to help others as God has led you to do. Remember that God’s best is always tied to God’s good purposes for your life and the world. When you pray for the best, you will succeed in fulfilling your purpose and bless you and many others in the process.
2. Pray for what only God can do: Even if God says “no” to your request, are you limiting your prayers to what you think could happen? If the answers to your prayers can be explained by your own efforts or chance, your prayers are probably too small. The prayers that truly grow our faith are the ones that, if answered, would force us to say that only God could have answered them. Don’t be afraid to pray for a miracle. That is something only God can do. Ephesians 3:20 points out that God will do more than you can ask or imagine. “Now to Him who does immeasurably more everything we ask or imagine, according to the power of God that is at work within us.” The phrase “immeasurably” should prompt us to seek the most important results possible. Jesus assures us in Matthew 19:26: “…all things are possible with God.” Prayer is effective and powerful. So pray for what only God can do. Even if you become estranged from your loved one and the relationship seems hopelessly broken, don’t give up. Instead, ask God to change your heart and the heart of the other person to bring about a breakthrough in the relationship. If you want a job opportunity but can’t make any progress on your own, once you find the perfect job for you, ask God to open the door for you and bless many people through you. When you pray for things that only God can do, you are exercising your faith and helping it grow. So take your eyes off your own limited power and focus on God’s infinite power. Let that power flow into your life by trusting God to do what you can’t do for yourself. Let go of logical expectations and look forward to God working some miracles in your life.
3. Move from praying about your own needs to praying about God’s Kingdom. Are you praying only for the immediate needs facing you and your loved ones? God cares deeply about you and your loved ones, but He also wants you to contribute to the work of His Kingdom in this world, and that includes praying for them. In Matthew 6:33, Jesus says that if you focus first on God’s Kingdom, God will meet all your needs. “But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” So step outside your circle and pray for the advancement of God’s kingdom in this fallen world. Keep in mind the things that are most important to eternity and pray about those topics regularly. There’s a big difference between praying to God for enough money to pay your bills and praying for God to give you the resources and opportunity to contribute to a ministry that will help thousands of people. Kingdom prayer shifts the motivation from supporting oneself, family, and friends in the present to support that is of eternal value to many. The Bible says in 1 John 5:14: “This is the confidence with which we approach God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.” Praying for the Kingdom of God is always in accord with God’s will. Try praying about the Kingdom of God by praying about topics such as spiritual revival in your local area, healing of national divisions, and aiding missionaries around the world. Think of all God loves and pray regularly for them as they travel beyond your immediate surroundings into more and more distant worlds. Pray about what you hear on the news, too, and ask God’s will to be done in each situation. When your motives are aligned with God’s purposes, you can pray with confidence and expect great answers to your prayers.
4. Pray for spiritual change, not just behavior modification: It’s good to pray for God’s help in changing unhealthy behaviors, but God does more than help you or someone else change superficially. God can empower you and others to transform spiritually at the deepest level. So instead of saying small prayers, like asking God to stop your spouse from doing something annoying or asking God to help you control his tantrums, ask God to address the root causes of those behaviors, not just the symptoms. Pray more to God to bring renewal and revival to you and others in your life. Only God can spiritually change a person’s heart, as Ezekiel 36:26 states, “I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; I will remove from you the heart of stone, and I will give you an heart of flesh.” So when you pray for yourself, don’t just ask God to help you change the behavior you want to stop, but tell God to give you a “carnal mind” that will naturally motivate you to change that behavior, a complete spiritual change. When you pray for difficult people in your life, you don’t just pray that they won’t get frustrated. Ask the Holy Spirit to give them a “new heart” to help them learn and grow spiritually. God can do more than human effort or therapy can accomplish. Praying big for change welcomes God’s infinite power at work in every situation you bring to Him in prayer.
5. Pray Persistently in Faith: Finally, great prayer includes not only the magnitude of the requests we make, but also the faith we show to God by praying persistently as we wait for Him to answer our prayers. If you want to pray more to God, you need to be persistent until you find the answer. You may still be struggling with doubt, but you should have enough faith to ask God to meet you where you are and help you find the strength to believe. When a father asked Jesus to heal his demon-possessed son, the father honestly told Jesus that he had some faith in Jesus, but also had some doubts. Mark 9:22 records Jesus’ father saying: “If you can do anything, have mercy on us and help us.” The next two verses, Mark 9:23-24, add: “If you can do anything, have mercy on us and help us.” Jesus said. “All things are possible to those who believe.” Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I believe. Please help me overcome unbelief!” That was enough for Jesus to respond in a meaningful way by casting out the demon and healing the boy. Jesus taught a powerful principle in Mark 11:24: “Therefore I say to you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” Jesus said that we should first believe that we have received the prayer before we see God’s answer to it. This is not easy. But if you choose to accept Jesus’ challenge and have faith that God will indeed answer your prayers according to His best, you will eventually see the answer come. So, without any doubt, reduce your request to a manageable size. When you begin to doubt, ask God to give you more faith to believe the big answer you were looking for in the first place. God will meet you where you are and give you more faith.
In conclusion, it is worth praying big prayers because you have a big God who will answer your prayers in big ways. Stop making small prayers that don’t expect much from God. Start praying more and choose to believe that God will do more for you when you pray big. As you do so, your faith will grow and you will find that God can do more than you can imagine.
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Whitney Hopler helps people discover the wonders of God and experience awe. She is the author of several books, including the nonfiction books Wake Up to Wonder and Wonder Through the Year: A Daily Devotional for Every Year, and the young adult novel Dream Factory. Whitney has served as an editor at major media organizations including Crosswalk.com, the national publication of the Salvation Army USA, and Dotdash.com (producing the popular Angels and Miracles channel). She currently leads communications operations at George Mason University’s Center for Human Services Advancement. Connect with Whitney on her website www.whitneyhopler.com and on her Facebook author page.
