The Time Is Now - Developing A Lifestyle Of Prayer

nonthreatening reminders. People respond well if reminded of a guideline before they have a chance to violate it, rather than after they have committed an embarrassing blunder. If you are not in a leadership position, tty tactfully presenting these guidelines to a leader, and let him or her do the teaching. In all circumstances, let your own example demonstrate basic prayer etiquette. Basic Principles A. Pray short prayers. When I was growing up, typically one person would stand and spend most of the meeting praying for all the missionaries. We all thought, What devotion! Then a couple others would fill out the remainder of the time. We couldn't understand why we never wanted to come back. Why short prayers? It's difficult for most of us to stay attentive to one person praying for ve1y long without becoming distracted and restless, especially if the prayer is not about us or an issue close to our hearts. This is just human nature. We can muster the attention needed to listen to and agree with a short prayer, but a meeting filled with long prayers will discour­ age people from returning. Also, short prayers show courtesy toward younger believers. A recent survey shows that most people's greatest fear is that of public speaking. It's difficult enough for a new person to speak one sentence in front of others. They find a long prayer full of "churchy" language a hard act to follow, and they may never return. This may also give them a lifelong fear of pray­ ing out loud. The short prayer rule is the most important to remind people about. Say it over and over (and over!), in humorous and varied ways, eve1y time a group gets ready to pray. What is a short prayer? The more people, the shorter the prayers. If there are only two, pray as long as you want. If you have six to twelve people, give a two-minute rnaximurn­ one minute is even better. 1. There is certainly a place for lengthy prayers, especially in private. But God also enjoys the shortest and simplest of prayers. What did God do in response to each of these short prayers?

Joshua 10:12-14

Judges 1628-30