The longest a whale can go underwater holding their breath is about 2 hours, but, on average, whales are breathing air every 5-15 minutes. This means their lives are oriented around the surface of the ocean - if they’re sleeping, hunting, or playing they need to make being close to air a priority!

In the same way, Jesus knew he needed time to share his heart with God, and he needed to listen and hear God speak to him. In the gospels, Jesus made prayer a regular pattern in his life-it was a priority for him, and he built his life around it.

Following Jesus means we pattern our life after his - what he says, we say. Where he goes, we go. What he does, we do. Jesus knew the crowds and the noise would be around him, and he wanted to stay connected with his Father: to seek his voice, his will, and to know his heart.

Prayer is one of the keys to growing in our relationship with God. This key unlocks humility, wisdom, understanding, patience, and so much more. Just like Jesus oriented his life around prayer, around staying in close communication with his Father, we should do the same.

But Jesus didn’t just pray alone. Some of the most well-known prayers of Jesus were prayed in community. Jesus made praying with others a priority. After the last supper, Jesus prayed two incredible prayers with his disciples. One was in John 17, when he prayed for his followers, asking his Father to help and strengthen us. The other was the night before he was crucified when he went to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray, and he invited Peter, James, and John to join him as he sought his Father’s will and wrestled with what was ahead.

Then Jesus went with them to the olive grove called Gethsemane, and he said, “Sit here while I go over there to pray.” He took Peter and Zebedee’s two sons, James and John, and he became anguished and distressed. He told them, “My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” He went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, “My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”
Matthew 26:36-39

There in the garden, the disciples heard Jesus crying out to God, pleading for help to face the agony of death on the cross. But even in his anguish and grief, Jesus trusted the Father’s plan and purpose.

Jesus was about to face something incredibly painful, and, in the Garden, we see his honesty in prayer. He wasn’t afraid to ask the Father if there was any other way. And Jesus brought support with him, asking his closest friends to pray alongside him in his darkest and most difficult hour. He knew that crying out to heaven to ask for help wasn’t something he had to do alone-his Father would hear all their petitions and prayers together.

Jesus showed us the importance of seeking the Father, but he also showed us the most powerful part of prayer: choosing to surrender what he wanted to what God wanted, what God willed. “Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”

How difficult that must have been for him to admit, knowing what was ahead. Jesus was about to be arrested, put on trial, beaten, whipped, and then crucified. He died for us so we could know the love and forgiveness of God the Father and so the world could see the trust and surrender Jesus had for God’s will and God’s plans.

“But I will do what the Father requires of me, so that the world will know that I love the Father.”
John 14:31

You might be thinking how hard it was for Jesus to surrender to God’s requirements of him as a display of his love. But this wasn’t the first time Jesus prayed for his Father’s will.

From the very beginning of his public ministry, Jesus taught his followers a pattern for prayer. Not something we have to say word-for-word, as if it was a spell or a mantra, but a guide for how to speak and listen to the Father.

In Matthew 6, we see Jesus on the mountainside teaching his disciples what it means to have the kingdom of heaven at work within them (the Sermon on the Mount). It is during this time on the mountainside that the disciples ask Jesus to teach them how to pray.

He said:

“Pray like this:
Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy.
May your Kingdom come soon.
May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us today the food we need, and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us.
And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.”
Matthew 6:9-13

Let’s finish today by breaking down that pattern Jesus gives us for prayer.

First, notice the beginning - “Our Father in heaven.” Jesus acknowledges the relationship God has with us, as a father to a child, and that God is available and listening; he is our Father in heaven, perfect in his love and care for us.

Next, Jesus invites us to humble ourselves in light of God’s holiness and power. He prays “Your name, Your Kingdom, Your will” because often on earth, we want our name to be known, our little kingdom to come, and our will to be done. It’s a pattern of surrendering our lives to his power, reminding us that God is the one in control - and we aren’t!

Finally, in light of our relationship with God and our surrender to him, we can ask for help. All of us need assistance in different areas - with physical needs like food and shelter but also with spiritual challenges like forgiving others and strength to fight temptation. Jesus knew we couldn’t win those battles without prayer - we need to make asking God for help a priority in this world!

And when we pray with this pattern - relationship, humility, surrender, and asking for help - prayer actually leads us into his will, and there he gives us more of his presence, forgiveness, provision, and guidance.

Prayer is communicating with God-listening and speaking to him. When we pray, we come to the Father through the Son by the Holy Spirit.

Prayer helps us to grow in our relationship with God.

Prayer reorders our thinking and helps us remember that he is the One we are dependent on and who deserves all our devotion.

When we come to God humbly, we can’t help but grow in our relationship with him. And although God might not always give us the easy, successful outcome we desire, we can be confident that through prayer, he will transform us into who he created us to be.