How to Pray Scripture

Have you ever run out of prayer juice? Like you pray, but there are no words for you to express, there are no feelings, it’s just emptiness and longing? Well if you have, you’re not alone. The good news is that there is a method and precedent for us to “pray scripture.” The practice of praying Scripture has deep historical significance. Tim Keller says this, “The psalms were Jesus’ songbook…. Indeed, there is every reason to assume that Jesu would have sung all the psalms, constantly, throughout his life, so that he knew them by heart. It is the book of the Bible that he quotes more than any other.” (Keller, Tim, The Songs of Jesus, 2015).

Today, I want to share an easy way to pray Scripture and use it as a spiritual discipline to help you grow in faith. We will look to Psalm 141 as our model and guide to pray Scripture. King David gives an example from his rich prayer life so we can apply it in our lives. Let’s learn from the patterns of words, repetition of words, and relationship of words to one another to guide our prayers as we personally seek, ask, and try to answer God. When we employ this type of prayer in our lives, we unlock how praying Scripture will always direct us to God’s heart.

O Lord, I call upon you; hasten to me!
    Give ear to my voice when I call to you!
² Let my prayer be counted as incense before you,
    and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice!
³ Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth;
    keep watch over the door of my lips!
⁴ Do not let my heart incline to any evil,
    to busy myself with wicked deeds
in company with men who work iniquity,
    and let me not eat of their delicacies!
⁵ Let a righteous man strike me—it is a kindness;
    let him rebuke me—it is oil for my head;
    let my head not refuse it.
Yet my prayer is continually against their evil deeds.
⁶ When their judges are thrown over the cliff,
    then they shall hear my words, for they are pleasant.
⁷ As when one plows and breaks up the earth,
    so shall our bones be scattered at the mouth of Sheol.
⁸ But my eyes are toward you, O God, my Lord;
    in you I seek refuge; leave me not defenseless!
⁹ Keep me from the trap that they have laid for me
    and from the snares of evildoers!
¹⁰ Let the wicked fall into their own nets,
    while I pass by safely.

Psalm 141 ESV

Four reasons we want to pray Scripture according to Psalm 141:

1. So God will hear us and be near us (Vv. 1-2)
2. So God will protect us from ourselves (Vv. 3-5a)
3. So God will deliver us from others (Vv. 5b-7)
4. So God will grant us peace and security on our path (Vv. 8-10)

The Easy Way to Pray Scripture

• Select and read a passage of Scripture. My suggestion is to start in the Psalms because that’s what the early Christians did. It’s also what Jesus did.
• Ask the following questions from the passage:
  • What did you learn about God?
  • What did you learn about yourself?
  • What do aspire to do, ask for, or act on as a result of reading the passage?
• Write down your answers to the questions above.
• Read the passage of Scripture again slowly as you pray through the answers of the three questions you just jotted down from your Scripture reading.

It is that easy.

Homework:

Pray 5 different Scriptures and share with me what you discovered.