Matthew 6:6

Matthew 6:6, “And when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut the door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. 7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. 8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.” This immediately precedes the sample prayer of Jesus. I’m sure our heavenly Father has planned a very good year for all of us, and the only way we can miss this is to be out of touch with Him. Often failure goes back to prayer. Sometimes people ask us to recommend a book of prayer. There is nothing new. I used to think praying was just telling God everything but I’m more concerned now with not telling God things, but listening to what God would say to us. “Listening, willing to obey.” That is not talking, is it? A little girl of seven and a boy of five were talking on a toy telephone. The girl answered the phone and handed it to her brother, saying, “It’s for you.” The boy said, “Hello. Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes,” and then hung up. His sister said, “Who was it?” “That was Daddy.” Daddy did all the talking and the boy listened. 

-Paul Boyd (deceased)