Page 88 - First Steps 2023

For instance, if you pray, “God, bless me today,” how will you know
if it happened? You woke up that morning; there’s a blessing. Was that
what you had in mind when you prayed?
But if you pray specifically, naming a specific request such as, “God,
I need $100 today to pay a bill that’s due” you’ll know by midnight if it
happened.
Specific prayers often start as a desire that then comes into focus so
it can become a specific request.
Here are some examples:

•You want to go to college (general) but then pray to gain admittance
to a (specific) school.
•You want to land a job (general) and then, after investigating a par-
ticular company, you pray (specifically) for a job there.
•You sense you’d like to be a missionary (general) and then ask for
provision to go to a (specific) mission field.

Is it presumptuous to make specific requests of God? James didn’t
think so when he was helping early disciples understand how prayer
works:

“You do not have because you do not ask God” (James 4:2).

God is eager to give good things to his children (Matthew 7:11)
because he loves us, and because when he answers our prayers, he
receives glory and our faith increases.
Plus, prayer ceases being a boring burden for us and becomes an
adventure.

3. Keep asking.
Jesus wanted his first followers to be tenacious when they prayed so
he told them this parable:

“Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they
should always pray and not give up. He said: ‘In a certain town there

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