How To Pray For Anyone | Prayer 101 (Ep. 3)

Welcome to the third part of our series called How to Pray. Today is about how to pray for others. All over the Bible you'll see people praying for other people. It's actually a powerful gift that Jesus says we can do for each other. Ever had the moment where someone says to you, Hey, I'll pray for you. Or have you ever said that to somebody? How do you follow through on it? What does that actually mean? Are you supposed to lay your hands on them? Or are you supposed to pray every hour on the hour for them for seven days? What counts? What works? What does God hear? 1 John 5.14 says this, That says, if you just ask, He hears you. If you ask using clunky language, He hears you. If you ask and you feel awkward about it, He hears you. If you ask one time and you forget the rest of the time, guess what? He hears you. It's an amazing gift. Now, you have to know up front that when you pray for other people, it doesn't turn them into robots. And it doesn't eliminate all of the pain and problems and brokenness of the world. What do I mean by that? Well, I've prayed for people who needed healing from self-inflicted behavior. They were addicted and I prayed, God, would you please help them break the addiction? Please get them through this. Now, my prayer did not turn them into a robot.

They still had a choice. Unfortunately, I've prayed for people to get through addiction and it hasn't happened. Does that mean that my prayer didn't work? Does it mean that God didn't hear me? No, it just means that person still had a choice. I've also prayed for people to be healed from diseases, from pain, from awful things that weren't a result of choices they were making. They were just a result of them living in this broken world. And guess what? Sometimes they haven't gotten healed. What does that mean? Does it mean that God didn't hear me? Does it mean he's not powerful? Does it mean that praying for other people is useless? No. Friends, it just means that sometimes the answer to prayer is yes. Sometimes the answer to prayer is no. Sometimes the answer to prayer is not yet. And in all of that, I can trust God that no matter what happens, he can work all things together for good. Now, it doesn't mean that I think he causes all pain, that he causes all suffering, that if I ask him to heal somebody, he goes, no, I'm not going to do it. See, friends, I think sometimes the world is a broken place and God says not yet. It's not going to be fully fixed yet. It's just not. God still invites us to pray powerfully and intercede for people. I have seen people healed through prayer. I have seen cancer diagnosis go from certain to now we can't find the cancer.

I've seen incredible things happen in prayer. I've seen in my own life when people pray for me, I have felt freedom from fear, freedom from anxiety. I felt confidence that I know wasn't there before they prayed for me. I've seen God show up and deliver miracles in my life through prayer. Now, if you've never prayed for other people, it can be intimidating. Again, what do I do? Do I have to be in the same room with them? Do I have to pray words out loud? This is kind of awkward. Well, listen, let me give you the basic starting spot. Just pray one prayer for another person. Now, I've found some of the most powerful prays that I ever pray for people are prayers that I actually type out as a pastor for Crossroads Church online. I get lots of emails from people and they'll ask me to pray for different things happening in their lives. Very rarely do I ever pick up the phone and call them usually because I don't have their number. And also, who calls anybody anymore? That's not a thing that happens. Instead, what I'll do is I'll just send them an email and I'll just literally type out my prayer. I'll turn the italics font on so they can see like, this is my words that I type. And then I'm going to italicize and hope that you pick up, this is my prayer. And I'll just type it out. Father, comma, thank you for Jane. Thank you for what you've done in her life so far.

She's experiencing pain and she's asking for prayer for X, Y, and Z. God, I'm asking you to do X, Y, and Z in her life. Thank you so much. We know that you hear us, amen. Type it, press send. I'm telling you, that prayer It's not only heard by God, it's heard by the person they ascended to. And that encouragement of knowing there's somebody else in their corner is priceless. There's a verse in Hebrews 4 that says, encourage one another today, while it's still called today, lest you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. One of the best ways to encourage another person is to pray for them. It lets them know that you're in their corner. And guess what? They probably know that praying for other people is awkward too. They probably know that praying for other people requires you to remember too. It takes time. They know that too. And guess what? When you do it, they understand that you are for them and in their corner. Praying for other people is a powerful and effective tool to build your faith and to build the faith of others.

Now, maybe there's somebody in your life who has asked for prayer recently. If there is, I wanna challenge you with this today. Send them a text or an email, or if you're so bold and you wanna do it, you can totally call them too. But a text will do just fine. Just type out a prayer. Hey, Matt, thought about you today. I know you asked me to pray for the job interview. So here's my prayer for you, colon, and then type out your prayer. It can be two sentences long. You will have just talked to the God of the universe and caused him to think about your friend, Matt, to hear your prayer, and you have encouraged your friend. Powerful and effective. If you wanna pray for someone today, you can do that right now. Maybe you don't have people in your life who've asked you for prayer. No problem, we have you covered. Just download the Crossroads app. It's completely free. Inside of that, you'll find an experience where you can pray for other people, real people. When they pop up on your screen, you can just ask God what to pray for. Sometimes you'll see something that they're asking for.

You can pray for that. If not, literally you can just say, God, you know this person. You know what they need. I'm bringing them to your attention, and I'm asking you to show up and meet them and provide for them in every single way, shape, and form of whatever they need. Amen. When you do that, you'll be entering into one of the most powerful things that God calls us to do. See, he calls us to love like Jesus. You know what Jesus did for you? He interceded for you. He interceded for us. He went before God and said, God, I wanna call your attention to this person. I want you to think about them. I'm asking you to rescue them. In fact, you can send me. I'm right here. And when we pray for other people, we are mirroring him. We're mirroring Jesus, saying, God, I wanna bring to your attention this person, my friend, Matt. God, I wanna bring to your attention this person in the app. I've never met him. I'm asking you to pay attention to them.

When you do that, you are entering into a step of faith, saying, God, I might not even ever see the result. I might not even get a yes to the thing I'm asking for. I'm asking in faith, trusting, and believing that you hear me. You see this person. Friends, I'm telling you, when you pray for other people, God will take you to a new place of depth and faith and trust with him.