THE PRAYER OF JESUS: Secrets to Real Intimacy with God by Hank Hanegraaff

Resource Description

Nashville: W Publishing Group (Thomas Nelson Publishers), 2001

 

A word about the author: Hendrik (Hank) Hanegraaff serves as president and chairman of the board of the North Carolina-based Christian Research Institute. He is also host of the nationally syndicated Bible Answer Man radio broadcast, which is heard daily across the United States and Canada — and around the world via the Internet at www.equip.org.

As I began to read Hanegraaff’s short book on prayer, THE PRAYER OF JESUS: Secrets to Real Intimacy with God, with a Foreward by Lee Strobel, I asked God to show me something new and insightful in order to grow my prayer life. Deep down I think I was looking for a secret, a magic formula, to make me into a man of prayer. I was like one of Jesus’ disciples, perhaps impetuous Peter, who blurted out, “Lord, teach us to pray.”

However, I didn’t get very far into the book before the author reminded me that just as there is no short-cut to becoming a good golfer (Hanegraaff’s hobby), there is none to becoming a man of prayer either. Great golfers become great by years of practice. “The secret to Tiger’s mastery of golf is the thousands of hours he spends practicing the fundamentals. And the secret to prayer is secret prayer.”

In my opinion, this work is a good summary on the fundamentals of prayer as taught by none other than Jesus Himself. Take a look at the chapter titles:

1. Lord Teach Us Now to Pray … He taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law. (Matthew 7:29)

 

2. The Secret … But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. (Matthew 6:6)

 

3. Your Father Knows … And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you even ask him. (Matthew 6:31)

 

4. Building Our Relationship … Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, (Matthew 6:9)

 

5. The City of God … your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heave (Matthew 6:10)

 

6. Bringing Our Requests … Give us today our daily bread. (Mathew 6:11)

 

7. The Compassion Award … forgive us our debts,as we also have forgiven our debtors. (Matthew 6:12)

 

8. The Armor … And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. (Matthew 6:13)

 

9. Into the Deep … As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. (Psalm 42:1)

 

10. Embracing the Prayer of Jesus … Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. (Matthew 7:24)

I recommend this one hundred page book as a primer for new disciples, as well as for people like me who have walked with the Lord for many years, but still have much to learn about communing with our Heavenly Father. It is easy to read with a number of interesting illustrations.

Probably the best take-away I got from the book is simply that I should make prayer a priority of my life, “secret prayer” that is, in contrast to public prayer.

At the end of The Prayer of Jesus the author includes a study guide on each chapter with questions to reflect upon and a space for the reader’s prayer journal. Here is what he wrote for the final prayer journal:

Prayer does allow us to touch heaven. Prayer is a beautiful foretaste of something we will experience for all eternity – unbroken communion with God. There we will forever explore the glory and grandeur of his grace and greatness. We have so much to look forward to in our relationship with God. We can begin to experience this communion with God even now by venturing out of the shallow waters of our askings and gettings and diving deep into the ocean of prayer. Now that we have seen the Lord’s Prayer is anything but a vain repetition or monotonous incantation, let us pray according to the pattern of the prayer of Jesus:

Our Father in heaven,

hallowed be your name,

your kingdom come,

your will be done,

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts,

as we also have forgiven our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation,

but deliver us from the evil one,

for yours is the Kingdom

and the power and the glory forever.

Amen