When we speak about prayer in relation to apologetics, we must always start with our own heart check. We must be engaging others from a position of love which is characterized by humility before God and man.  Paul wrote to the Corinthians that if we are acting without love, then we are just making noise, and Peter wrote that we must be motivated by love (gentleness) and respect when providing answers to folks about our faith and the hope we carry.  So when we do our own heart check, we recognize that a humble heart is a grateful heart, a thankful heart, and a genuine desire for the eternal goodness of our hearers!

All prayer must begin with gratitude and giving thanks!  As God is the subject and object of worship, so God is also the subject and object of prayer!  As we start to grow up and mature in our faith, God, ourselves and those we pray for come into better perspective, but that doesn’t mean that thankful prayer will always be automatic, so we must be mindful to practice this type of prayer.  Scripture tells us to be devoted to prayer, keeping alert while maintaining an attitude of thanksgiving (Colossians 4:2).  So we can see in this verse that we are called to be discipline and consistent in directing our minds and hearts towards Christ in our prayer.  When we do this, we are also keeping ourselves in proper perspective which helps us cultivate an attitude of thanksgiving.

A thankful heart begins to grow when self-awareness becomes sin-awareness, which is the place where the gratitude of grace is magnified as we truly see the depths of our total depravity. [Now it must be stated that the term sin-awareness is not a focus on our struggle or what weighs us down, but rather it is a focus on our freedom and the mercy we have been granted.  The world today preaches self, self-focus and self-empowerment and self-love and good thoughts and good vibes and positivity, and dozen of other man focused ideas that leave God out of the picture; we live in a very “me” centered culture, but for the Christian, we must seek to be “other” focused, and that focus begins with God, the One who made us possible and made all things possible.  If we are not other focused, we will fail miserably at any attempt to do evangelism and apologetics].  In this place, prayer cultivates a deeper sensitivity for those who do not know Jesus.  As our burden for the lost grows, we also begin to see the layers of pride being peeled away like an onion as we can now look at a person without faith and feel compassion for them.  We start to grow the compassion of Jesus that we see in Matthew 9:36-38, and the working out of the love of God manifesting in our hearts as the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are truly children of God.  If you have ever prayed for someone and been overcome with tears and yearning to see someone receive saving faith, then you have had been to this place of being like Jesus.  Paul describes this in Colossians 4:12 in telling us about the agonizing prayer of Epephras.  This agonizing prayer is a work of the Holy Spirit in us for both the unbeliever and the believer, to receive faith and to grow in faith.

In apologetics, we start with prayer because we can easily get entangled in the intellectual aspect of evangelism, so we need to guard against this intellectual pride and always remember we cannot reason anyone into the Kingdom of God.  God may use us to remove a barrier of faith to help someone take steps towards the cross, but ultimately it is God who convicts of sin (John 16:8) and it is the kindness of God that leads people to repentance (Romans 2:4).  So, we do need to be prepared to give every person an answer for the hope we have within us (1Peter 3:15), and we need to contend earnestly for the faith (Jude 3), and we do need to study the Bible so we can handle it correctly (2Timothy 2:15), and we do need to hold firmly to the truth that the word of God is living and active and convicts hearts (Hebrews 4:12), and the most critical part of this preparation is thankful prayer.

Some scriptures to learn so they can be incorporated into prayer include that God reveals Himself to them (Matthew 16:17), that they hear His voice (Hebrews 4:7), that God replace their heart of stone with a living, breathing heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:25-27), and that their heart be good soil to receive the seed of the gospel in a true, life changing way (Matthew 13, parable of the Sower).  Also pray for yourself so that you know when to speak, what to share, ask God to give your the words.  If you are engaging an unbeliever who is hurting, perhaps there are no words, but many ways you can love them.  Sometimes just being present, being available can be a tremendous help.  I was recently speaking with a man who is on a dark path that I had traveled, so I simply asked him, “do you want to go get a steak and some beverages and not talk about it?”  That question was met with an enthusiastic Yes!  Because I have been in his shoes, I knew from personal experience that there were no words and no scripture that was going to bring any magical healing, there will be time for that later, but for now we need to tend to the bleeding so the healing can begin.  My encouragement to you is that as you read scripture and have time with God, take note of the many prayers in scripture and how you can incorporate them into your prayer life for both those we seek to be saved and those we want to help grow!  Amen!

Prayer: Eternal God, heavenly Father, you have graciously accepted us as living members of your Son our Savior Jesus Christ, and you have fed us with spiritual food in the Sacrament of His Body and Blood.  Send us now into the world in peace and grant us strength and courage to love and serve you with gladness and singleness of heart, through Christ our Lord. Amen!