Prayer is our greatest Christian privilege and therefore, it is not optional for anyone who wants to develop a personal relationship with God. Prayer was designed by God to be the primary method of receiving His help and advancing His kingdom. But we notice that we fail more in our prayer life than any other place. And God knows this, that’s why He gave us Someone to help us in our prayer life and that Someone is the Holy Spirit. He gave us the Holy Spirit to instruct, inspire, and illumine our hearts and minds.
Without the help of the Holy Spirit, we would be likely to pray for things not only contrary to God’s will but injurious to ourselves. In John 4:24, Jesus encouraged His followers, “God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth”. So the Spirit of God plays an important role in Our prayer life. He is the Spirit of prayer and He is the One who leads us in prayer. It is He who is to make a true life of prayer possible for us.
The Bible teaches that there are two possible conditions for the Christian. One is to walk according to the Spirit, the other is to walk according to the flesh that is the carnal nature of man.
Romans 8:7 quotes, “Because the wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God. For it is not subject to the law of God: neither can it be. And they who are in the flesh cannot please God” When we are walking according to the flesh, we wouldn’t want to pray and we cannot persevere in our prayer life. But when the Holy Spirit is in us and we are yielded to the Spirit, it is as normal as breathing to pray. So we are to worship God in Spirit.
Praying in the Spirit is Biblical and we should practice it on all occasions. Ephesians 6:18 says, “ By all prayer and supplication praying at all times in the spirit: and in the same watching with all instance and supplication for all the saints”. Jude 20 also says, “But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit”.
When we are praying in the Spirit, the Holy Spirit also prays together with us and it is He who activates our will in prayer. He leads us into the presence of the Father and gives us the faith to believe that God will answer our prayers for through Him we have our access in one Spirit to the Father.
When we are filled with the Holy Spirit, the Spirit in us recognizes God as our Father, and it is the natural thing for the Spirit filled person to call “Abba Father”. For Galatians 4:6 says “God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”. And the Holy Spirit makes us to confide in the presence of God. The Holy Spirit takes our prayers according to the will of God for He alone knows and can interpret God’s will and purpose. He takes our unworthiness and imperfect prayers and puts them in a form acceptable to Our heavenly Father.
Paul gives further light on the activity of the Holy Spirit in prayer, Roman’s 8:26 “The Spirit Himself intercedes for us with emotions too deep for words”.
Sometimes the Holy Spirit takes charge when we have no words to express our prayers. In our darkest hours, the Holy Spirit of God combines with our spirit in wordless. The Spirit of God aligns our hearts with God’s and He prays for those things we’re longing for.
The Holy Spirit is the Sustainer and the founder of our spiritual life. That’s the reason Jesus promised a Counselor to His followers, Someone who would always be with them and in them. As John 14:16-18 says, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever, the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you”.
Therefore, all true prayers should be done by means of the Holy Spirit and in dependence on His help. Because the only secret of a real prayer life is to be filled with the Spirit.
