My best definition of prayer is simple: prayer is communicating with God. This straightforward concept can help put us at ease, especially when we realize that communication involves more than just talking. We communicate through music and body language and sculpting and painting and facial expressions and dancing and writing -- even macramé! We each have our favorite modes of communication, and God is fluent in all of them. So if talking isn’t your thing, you can still be good at praying.
Whether you pray by talking or by some other mode of communication, God most enjoys the prayer that is natural, direct, and simple. One of the most important qualities of effective communication is gut-level honesty. God hates it when we wear masks to the meeting, when our prayers become showy and inauthentic. Here are Jesus’ instructions: “When you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full… And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.” (Matthew 6:5,7)
-- Craig Groeschel in “The Christian Atheist: Believing in God but Living as if He Doesn’t Exist”
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