The situation was serious. One of those where, if the Lord didn’t do what only He could do, the enemy would win.

I couldn’t stand that thought, and so I was hunkered down, praying as hard as I could. I pleaded with the Lord for what I believed needed to happen. I reminded Him of things promised. I prayed in His Name, and invoked the covenant blood of Christ. I bound the enemy. It was warfare, and I was fighting for my friend.

I had been there many times. Full of compassion for one in need of a miracle, and full of faith in the Lord’s ability to do something about it. To do a miracle. I’ve seen miracles, and amazing, creative answers to prayer. I’ve also had prayers go unanswered.

I have so much faith in the Lord’s goodness and power that even when a prayer does not get answered, my confidence in the Lord never wanes. I accept that there are things I can’t or won’t know at times. As my husband used to tell people, “Our job is to pray in faith, and leave the results up to God.”

But on this day, I felt as if my prayers were falling to the ground. I knew the Lord heard them, that He is always with me. But I had no confidence in the words coming out of my mouth, so I just said more words, good words I had used often in prayer.

Finally, sensing the Lord wasn’t responding, I fell silent, and waited. A scripture came clearly to mind, which I turned to in my Bible:

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

2 Corinthians 10:3-5 (NIV)

Then I remembered something very important. Something we used to teach in our classes on prayer. I had not asked the Lord how HE wanted me to pray. I had just taken off willy-nilly, full of confidence in my ability to pray.

Lord, I asked, “how should I pray for this situation and this person?”

The Lord answered, “Thank you for asking!”

Then He told me exactly how to pray, His instruction very short and amazingly simple. It was very different way to attack the problem at hand. I knew God had handed me a simple stone to launch at my Goliath, replacing the clunky armor and weapons that just didn’t fit in this situation.

I prayed then, according to God’s simple instruction. How different my prayers felt! I knew then my words were not falling to the ground. My confidence soared that God heard me and would answer my prayer.

And He did just that in the days that followed! I later remember John’s words:

This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.

1 John 5:14-15 (NIV)

No one wants you to pray powerful, effective prayers more than the Lord. Yet He chose weak, fallible, human you to work through and partner with to do His will on earth.

Take notice, child of God: what is your faith in when you pray? Let it not be in your knowledge about how to pray. Let it be fully invested in His power, His wisdom and guidance, His ability.