In Jesus’ teaching on prayer, he tells us to pray to our Father where nobody will see. And when we do that, God will reward us for our prayer. It seems rather strange to be rewarded for praying. What kind of reward do we get? A new car? More points toward heaven?

While psychologists and medical researchers have noted the physical and mental health benefits of prayer (it reduces stress for one thing), that’s probably not what Jesus had in mind. Discovering what Jesus meant means we need to know how Jesus and his followers understood prayer.

Reading through the Bible, it seems that prayer for God’s people is simply having a conversation with God. And who is God? Among many things, God is our friend. In fact, the book of Genesis says we were created to be like God for friendship with God. When Jesus chose his disciples, Mark tells us that the first reason was that he wanted to be “with them” (Mark 3:14). Jesus’ friendship with his disciples was the foundation of their mission together.

Simply put, prayer is two friends talking together, where one of them happens to be God—a very simple but also profound activity. When friends have a conversation, it can go anywhere. But the deeper the friendship, the more honest, compassionate, courageous, and healing the conversation tends to be. Conversely, the more risks we take in our conversation, the deeper our friendship becomes.

So how does God reward us when we pray? Turns out that our conversation with God is the reward. Think about it. Can you imagine having an all-access 24/7 pass to your favorite lead singer or sports hero? And what if a friendship developed and you were actually invited to be part of the band? There’s no need for a reward beyond that! And that’s what we have with prayer: an all-access 24/7 pass to the Creator of the universe, who desires to be friends with us, and we’ve even been invited to be part of the band!

Reflection:

  • What has been your experience with prayer? Positive? Negative? Something else?
  • What are some of the ways you pray? Written or spontaneous? Perhaps even sung?
  • What do you find rewarding about prayer? What do you need for prayer to be rewarding?