Men Who Lead

And we're live. Okay, cool. So I'm excited about what we're talking today because we are going to talk about how to start praying together.

Does that sound good? Yeah, I think this kind of stems from we've talked to a handful of couples who love God and want to pursue a God-centered marriage and care about having God at the center of their marriage, and yet they don't pray together. And in fact, we've met couples who've never prayed together. And it was so surprising to me that two people who know each other so well, who love each other so much, and who have faith is such an integral part of their lives, had never heard each other pray before.

Yeah, totally. And I guess they're not alone in that because for a long time, we did this ourselves where it just wasn't really a habit or a mindset that we could partner together in prayer. And I think really when it comes down to it, the why of why this is important, why should you pray together, it's because you want a God-centered marriage.

If you want God to be in the center of your marriage, you've got to invite him in. And a great way to invite him in is through the power of prayer. And so as the Bible says, for where two or three are gathered in my name, that's actually Jesus's words.

That's from Matthew 18 20. And so I think that the first step really is to just invite God to be in your prayer time together. Yeah, if we take it back a step, I think it's a weird thing, right? Faith seems to be a very personal thing, and spiritual things feel very personal.

And so a lot of times you've had this life with God and these experiences, and they've been very personal and very intimate. And then all of a sudden, you are connecting to someone else and it becomes something that is designed for you to share together. Yeah, exactly.

Because you feel like, I pray by myself and I seek God on my own, but how do I do that together with somebody else? Totally. You can be a mature believer, grown up in the church, praying daily with God, but then all of a sudden, it's just different when you have to pray with someone else. It's normal to do it in the church.

You have some small group settings, and all of a sudden, it becomes a very, for better or for worse, a very vulnerable act to surrender yourself to, to do it with someone else. And it's awkward. I think it is awkward in the beginning to get started and to just say, okay, how do we do it? Yeah.

And if we're talking about a why pray together, we often talk to couples about spiritual intimacy. And yeah, it's so intimate to pray together because you're really sharing these deep and maybe dark parts of yourself. They're the things that you would share with God, but when you're sharing them with your spouse, it takes it to a whole nother level in terms of your relationship with them too.

Yeah. Yeah. And I think I want to make sure I want to put a little caveat here that we're not saying that if you're married, you must always be praying whenever you pray that together with your spouse.

Of course, continue on a vibrant prayer life in a relationship with God just between you and God in individual time. But I believe that in marriage, let's just call it a secret. It's not a secret.

It's just a, what do you call it? It's like a great spiritual habit to build is to pray together, is to seek God together. And I think there's a lot of things we can do together. We can serve together.

We can worship together, attend church. And it's just, it's this different thing that I think it's a little bit of a sensitive subject when you ask someone, do you guys pray together? Yeah. We pray when we eat at the dinner table.

We pray, maybe we even pray at church together. We'll hold hands and when the pastor is praying, that's us praying together. And that is, but I think this, if you talk about a daily habit that you guys do, whether it's just before bed, as you're going to sleep, or even if it's just all throughout the day, it can be really anytime, anywhere.

But just that idea, I think, is really foreign to couples if they haven't ever tried that before. Yeah. So I think that we, so we've talked about why pray together.

We've talked about how important it is creating a God-centered marriage. So when you do this, I guess the first question is, what do we pray about? What kind of stuff can we pray about together? What kind of stuff is okay and allowable, permissible? Is there anything that's off limits? We have talked to some couples who've had trouble starting because they don't know what to say, how to say it. And our recommendation has been, start with one sentence prayer.

Just get your feet wet, right? Dear God, thank you for this time that we've had together. And thank you that you're growing us in our marriage. Amen? Yeah.

Start small and don't feel like you have to use big fancy words. And that's been our encouragement to these couples who've never prayed together before, is start simple and try it and do short one sentence prayers. And it takes the, I don't know, it takes the stress off of it if it's really just one sentence.

And then if you feel awkward, it's only for 10 seconds. I think that's a great point. I think you touched on something that, Ashley, we're talking about doing all these things.

How do we pray together? And I think the first thing, maybe if we take a step back, is that you have to have a lot of your maybe apprehensions or fears or whatever around this is based on your own prayer life, your own prayer experience. Because if you're not regularly prone with God, how do I bring someone else into that? When you come before God, it feels like it has to be this really proper moment. It has to be done in a perfect setting.

It has to be, I'm approaching a holy God and I can only access him or talk to him at certain points of the day or when I'm really in trouble, when I'm really in need. When there's something really pressing on my heart or a tragedy is happening or something like that. And all of a sudden, then I say, why don't you guys always pray together? Why don't you start a habit of praying together? I'm not even sure I'm comfortable approaching God myself.

And so how do I do it with someone else? I think that just starting there, recognizing that I would invite anybody who is saying, okay, I don't know where to start. I think it's also a good question to say, where's your own prayer life at? Is that going? And that's not to say that you can't do it with your spouse if you don't have a good prayer life going. I think that that can be also a compliment.

Then you guys can continue to encourage each other in prayer and encourage each other to continue seeking God and you can do it together and apart. But yeah, just to keep that in mind, maybe a lot of the fears that you might have praying with someone else or praying with your spouse, starting to pray with your spouse could be based on just your own. Maybe you're not getting a lot out of your own prayer life and not really sure why.

I don't know. Am I supposed to leave my spouse in that? Am I supposed to tell her what to pray or tell him what to pray? Or does he just pray whatever he wants to pray and then I pray whatever I want to pray and then just be with that together? What do you think? I think you're talking about what we pray about, right? So what do we pray about? What do we pray about? I think my answer is we can pray about everything and anything. Yeah.

I think the default when we want to pray to God is that it's because we need something. I need something from you, God. I need your help.

I need some resources. I need you to come through here. I think that's a good thing.

We can call out to God in prayer for anything that we need when we're anxious, when we have worry. In fact, it says in Philippians 4, 6 through 7, do not be anxious about anything, but everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. It says, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Yeah. Don't be anxious about anything, but in everything, do it in prayer, present your requests, anything that you want, just bring it to God. I think that verse gives us permission to bring out all things to God and that's how God can help us there.

I was just reminded about how we often talk about, and it's probably more often the wives, but wives coming to their husbands and saying, these are all the horrible things that happened in my day. And this is broken and this is awful. And this is what I really struggled with today.

And then husband's natural reaction is to try to fix it. And then wives go, I didn't want you to fix it. I just wanted you to know it was in my heart.

I think it's very cool that a husband, instead of trying to fix it in their own power, they could say, can we pray about that together? And that is for husbands, that allows you to do something. And for wives, that really allows you to know that you feel hard because your husband's going to be praying for you about it, but also you're presenting your requests to God, right? These anxious feelings and thoughts and frustrations of the day, you're presenting those requests to God, letting those requests be made. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

What a diffuser. Something like that happens. I'm telling you, this is what happened today.

And you're trying to fix it. And I'm like, oh, this is not what I wanted from you. What a way to diffuse the situation by I hear you.

Can we pray about that? Let's pray about that together. And that might not be your natural inclination. I think it's taken us a long time to get to that place where it becomes a natural part of what we do.

I can be complaining about something. I can read an article online. And did you hear about this article? And let's pray about it.

And it's a mind shift and a heart shift for me. And then I think it also draws us together. Obviously, it draws us closer to God, but it draws us closer to each other too when we're able to present those things to God.

Yeah, yeah. Even as you suggested, instead of fixing it, just you might suggest, and girls do it too. But instead of responding, your first response being, can I tell you what I think? Or let me tell you what I would do.

It is a great first thing you can even say. Because part of me is wrestling with, oh, but I'm saying the fixer in me wants to say, can I still fix it too? But it is great to start with God and to say, and let's just say, so let's, for example, you, give me an example of something about you. Okay.

A kid threw a tantrum today, and I was so frustrated that I yelled, and I'm really losing my patience with this one. I don't know. Yeah.

And so my inclination would likely be, have you tried this? Yeah. What was the trigger? What started it? What did you actually say that, why didn't you put more boundaries? Whatever it is, before I offered my two cents, a great thing would be to say, hey, thank you for sharing that with me. I'm sorry.

That was hard. Can we pray about that? I know that sounds funny. Yeah.

But can we just pray about God? Let's just ask God for wisdom before I try to give you my wisdom. In fact, the Bible says in James 1.5, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. And so yes, this is something for your own prayer life.

You can always come to God and ask him for wisdom. If you lack it, just ask him. He'll give generously to you more wisdom.

He gives generously to all without reproach. God gives you wisdom. And what a great thing that you can remind your spouse, well, have you asked God to help you with this yet? Like, oh no, I haven't.

Let's do it together. Can we just do it together? And then I'll tell you my wisdom or something like that. But I think if you're talking about being God centered, you want God to be at the center of your marriage.

I don't know if you guys can see my hand here. We're actually right next to each other. But if you want God to be in the center, you've got to invite him to come into the center.

And a great verbal way to make yourselves mindful and conscious of that is to say, let's go to God first before we discuss this. Yeah. I think more often than not, we're coming to God with our requests, right? These are the things that I'm going through, God.

This is what's on my heart. This is where I need you. Another thing that we can pray about, though, that I think really builds intimacy, spiritual intimacy in your marriage is praying with gratitude, right? Or to be thankful with thanksgiving.

And I think that has been something that's been really enriching for us is to just find moments to pray, to thank God. Not necessarily asking for something, but to thank him. And I'm thinking of a time where we're driving in the car and the sky was really pretty.

And you said to the kid, let's pray and thank God for this sunset. I'm a sucker for landscapes, by the way. So I'm always... Yes.

Almost every day you make mention of the clouds. Yeah. Just having this attitude of thankfulness and gratitude before God, praying in gratitude with your spouse, there's such a mind shift when you are grateful.

And so, yeah, coming to God with that, I think, allows you both to be grateful together. It puts you in a more positive headspace. Yeah.

So not just presenting requests, but also just coming to God in gratitude. Yeah. I like that a lot.

I think the things that we're talking about here, asking for wisdom, bringing to God all of our anxieties, having thankfulness and gratitude, these are things that we could just do ourselves. And if you practice that and just talk about it with each other and had positive attitudes and that kind of stuff, that would be great. That would be great for your marriage.

You would do a lot for your marriage. If you had positive conversations, just centered around these things like, hey, can I share with you something that I'm anxious about? And then you just gave me some comfort. That's all great.

But if you're going back to the why pray together, it's because we want to have a God-centered marriage. And so what we're doing is we're taking what we can do in our own power, and we're asking God to supercharge the results here by inviting him in to these things that we can do. And I think when he does that, not only does it make it a God-centered marriage, but I think that he blesses the results of just those intimate practices that we can have between each other.

I think the other thing too is I can ask Steve, will you pray for me about this? And he can go and pray for me by himself, and I can go pray for myself by myself. But there's something really powerful that happens when we pray together. Do we already read that one? Which one? Yeah.

For where two are here gathered in my name, there am I among them. You're inviting God into your relationship together. So it's not just a you and God thing.

It's not just a you pray for me by yourself with God thing. When you do it together, you're really inviting God. God is there with you.

Yeah. Yeah, that's right. And I think we just illustrated a lot of different situations when you could be praying together.

And so I just want to make sure we sort of button that up there, like when and where should you pray together? Where could you pray together? What do you think? A place? Where and when? When's a good time to pray together? Where are some good times to pray together? And I'm not trying to say it's a question. Yeah, I do feel like I'm like... The obvious answer, maybe it's like the implied answer sounds like everywhere, anytime, but it's okay. And maybe the way to get into that mindset of allowing yourself to see the possibilities is to just say, what if we just... Maybe a lot of the holdup is not necessarily when or where it's just, can we do it? And if we do it, how does that look like? How could that be comfortable? But I just thought about when or where.

So I think that there's different kinds of prayers that we bring to God, right? For us, the when and where is anytime, anywhere, but those are the kind of prayers where you're driving down the street and an ambulance goes by and you say, God, me in that situation, God protect those people. Read an article and you see something horrific or tragic that's happened. You can pray in that moment right there, right then.

I think there's a different kind of prayer when let's say that we are trying to make a big decision together. That's not an anytime, anywhere kind of prayer. That is like a, let's set aside a time.

Let's find a space. Let's carve out time and let's come together and really seek God on that. And when we talk about when that could be, let's pray for the next 10 days about this one thing or we're seeking wisdom in this one area.

We need to know, God, what do you want from us? We need your wisdom here. And we'll do that. We'll pray.

We'll say, let's pray for the next five days and see what God says. Yeah. So I think what you're saying here is that depending on the type of request or the size of request or the result that you're seeking, you're going to dedicate maybe naturally intentionally more time to that specific prayer.

And so if it's something like, okay, let's try a headline that really bothered me. Instead of worrying about it or just thinking about it randomly or needlessly, let me just give it to God. You have a thing that sometimes you'll just come across.

There's something on my heart. I just need to share it with you. Can you just share this burden with me? And it'll be some sort of bad news that you came across in the day.

Someone was kidnapped or something like that. And I think it would mess with me too, because I'd be like, oh my goodness, that's horrible. Why did you tell me that? And so we said, why don't we just pray about that? You didn't just read the news for no reason, right? I've got time to read the news.

And I'm not saying that you should just pray about it, but I'm saying since we're talking about it, let's just pray about it. I think that is actually a great mindset to go to when we're talking about prayer. Since we're talking about it, why don't we pray about it? Yes.

And so whether it is, hey, my in-laws are coming over today. Oh great. Can we pray about that? It can be that, or it can be something like, honey, I'm not really feeling fulfilled in my job right now.

And I'm really feeling like I want out. And I just, I don't know what to do. What do you think? And it's okay, honey, let's pray about that.

Let's ask God for wisdom here. So yeah. So I think that we've covered the when and where, and then how can you pray together? How can that look? I think we've demonstrated it in like many way.

Let's talk about the first prayer of let's just say that you don't pray together currently, or your only friends are at the dinner table or just with the pastor at church. Like just, okay, I'm praying that my wife's holding hands. How do you talk to your spouse about this and say, honey, I'd love to experience prayer with you.

I'd love to have a migrant prayer light in our marriage. I think that this is something that could be beneficial for both just our emotional or spiritual intimacy, but I'd love to get started. I guess those are some words you can use, but anything else that you might suggest to someone who wants to bring up the issue or not an issue, but bring up the suggestion to their spouse.

I think we've used this a lot. So you and Michelle were talking about praying together and they were saying it was a good idea. Do you think we could try that? Yeah, exactly.

I heard it on a podcast. I read it in a book. People blame us all the time for the weird things that they're coming up with because we presented the idea.

Yeah. Something like, yeah, I heard it here or I read it here. Or some people say that if you pray together, you stay together or something cheesy like that, but yeah, just bring up the issue, whatever words you guys use and just introducing and just saying, what do you think? Does that sound good to you? Any thoughts on that? Yeah, we could start that.

I've never really seen a situation. I will say that it does feel like there tends to be one person that feels the need a little, maybe a little bit more than the other. And so there probably is one person that's more likely to instigate prayer.

And that person may be another person that needs to get the ball rolling. But I've never seen a situation where someone said, I'd really love to pray with you. And the other person says, no way, not into that.

We're not going to pray together. I think you approach with an attitude of, I think this would good for us. I really want to grow with you.

I don't think even people who are not, don't have a faith or are not spiritual or don't pray by themselves, typically they're not opposed to you praying for them or with them. I think that there is one person usually that kind of gets it started. Yeah.

And so I think that just going back even to, they might say like, why do you want to do that? And just saying whether it's, I think it would be good for our marriage or I heard about this concept of just having a God-centered marriage and we go to church together, but I think there's other ways that we could get deeper in that. And so I thought maybe a simple way could be prayer. You've said that you don't have time to do this or that or whatever.

You don't have time to read the Bible together. Okay. That's a different issue.

But I think that if, and maybe another question that they ask is what would we do? I was like, let's pray. How long do you want to pray for? These are natural questions. It's not a bad question actually.

And which leads to the question of how can we pray together? So let's just demonstrate what, this is just from the very beginning. Let's just say, so you have that conversation and you go, okay, sure. So how does that start? What does that look like? What's the first prayer that you guys can pray together? I think it probably starts with the conversation.

Is there anything that you would like to pray about? Yeah. No. What about you? Yeah.

And then the person that's instigating will say, the reason that I really wanted to pray was because I'm feeling like we can connect more. I think that it would help us to connect. There are a couple of things that I'm anxious about, things that I feel like I need wisdom for.

Yeah. Okay. Great.

Yeah. And I think that even if it's not even meeting, let's say that there's nothing really big happening at the moment. There's usually something that's going on between you guys or in your guys' lives that you can pray about.

But also it can just be like, Hey, can we just start thanking God together? I'd like to do that as a practice, as just a habit. Just like you wake up in the morning together and you say, honey, hold my hand. We're going to pray.

God, thanks for this day. Bless it. In Jesus name.

And start, it can be as simple as that. It can be, you guys are going to bed together. God bless us as we sleep.

We need some good rest. Amen. Simple as that.

Or it can be based on a Bible verse. This goes back to just all the practices that you've learned about how to pray on your own. You can just apply it and use it with your spouse.

And would you add anything else in terms of how that might look? No. Any other? Yeah. I think that it's really just about doing it and getting started, getting used to the feeling, getting used to hearing their voice, praying for you or praying about your need often.

Sometimes the hang up even really is just hearing your own voice talking out loud. Yes. That's a great point that you touched on because a lot of people are maybe just even, they're okay with their own prayer life, but they're uncomfortable with how they might sound to someone else.

Particularly when you're praying by yourself, you just do it in your head. You don't necessarily feel like you need to pray out loud. So praying out loud is a different game.

That's true. Because you actually have to formulate words. I think you hit a big point there.

But yes, the only way through is really just to get started and just get used to it. Hopefully your spouse is someone safe that you can be yourself with and very likely hearing your voice all day. And so I think that it would be the best place if anybody that you were going to trust in prayer to get started with.

So yeah. Is there anything else that you'd add to that? No, I don't think so. But start praying together.

Yeah. Start praying together. If you are at a place where you have not ever prayed before, I think it would be a great conversation to have with your spouse.

Tell them that you want to have a God-centered marriage. You want to invite God-centered marriage and prayer to the place you'd like to start. So try that out.

Let us know how it goes. And we'll talk to you guys next time. Bye.