How to Pray

Once you believe prayer is genuinely welcomed, not graded, the next question is simply practical: what do you actually say? Here’s a simple frame that’s carried me for years.

The Pattern Jesus Gave Us

When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, he didn’t hand them a theory. He gave them a short, structured prayer to actually use — what we now call the Lord’s Prayer. Notice the shape of it: it opens by orienting toward God and his purposes before it ever asks for anything, then moves to real, concrete needs, then ends with forgiveness and protection. It’s a template, not a script to recite mindlessly, and you can build your own prayer time on that same shape.

A Simple Frame: A.C.T.S.

One tool I hand people who don’t know where to start is the acronym A.C.T.S. Adoration: tell God who he is, out loud if you can. Confession: name what’s actually true about where you’ve fallen short this week, specifically. Thanksgiving: name what he’s actually given you, specifically. Supplication: ask, plainly and without polishing your requests into something more spiritual-sounding. You don’t need all four every time, but together they keep your prayers from collapsing into only ever asking for things.

Start Absurdly Small

If you haven’t prayed consistently in years, don’t aim for thirty minutes tomorrow morning. Aim for three. Say one honest sentence to God before your feet hit the floor. Consistency at a tiny size beats ambition that collapses by Thursday. Let it grow the way everything else we’ve talked about grows — slowly, from an actual root.