Prayer 101: Intimacy With God

By Darryl L. Gay

This book outlines some practical steps to engage in, which will ensure that your prayer life will become more vibrant, personal, and effective. You will be inspired to pray from a position of confidence and assurance because you realize that when you pray, God will always provide you with an answer. The alternative is wishing and hoping like many Christians that God hears their prayers, which often lead to increased frustration and a lackluster relationship with our Creator. The Bible makes it clear with many examples as well as numerous Scriptural Verses that it is not the will of God for any of His beloved children to pray from a position of insecurity or fear. Your personal relationship with the Lord will blossom as you intimately walk daily with Him by implementing the concepts revealed in this book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 20, 2024
• ISBN: 9798886162622

Book preview

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Prayer 101

Intimacy With God

Darryl L. Gay

ISBN 979-8-88616-261-5 (paperback)

ISBN 979-8-88616-262-2 (digital)

Copyright © 2024 by Darryl L. Gay

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

To my wife, First Lady Mireille Pierre-Louis Gay, I praise the Lord for using you to teach and inspire me not to just finish this project but finish every work that the Lord requires of me in the future. Your drive and tenacity inspire me to push harder than ever for greatness. He used you, your patience, and your unconditional love to bring me out of deep darkness and depression; and I am forever grateful to the Lord for bringing you into my life when I needed you most. You have all my heart, love, and gratitude forever.

To my former wife of twenty-nine years, Prophetess and Pastor Elaine Martin Gay, whom the Lord used to encourage and teach me by example how to share His unconditional love with others. She passed and went to be with the Lord on August 8, 2021, which left me heartbroken. I know you are cheerleading for me to complete this work that you were a vital part of from its inception. To my surprise, the Lord decided to bless me with my current wife to help me restore my life and get this book across the finish line.

Introduction

Chapter 1

Purpose of Prayer

Chapter 2

Hindrances to Prayer

Chapter 3

Blueprint for Prayer

Chapter 4

Types of Prayer

Chapter 5

Prayers in the Bible

Chapter 6

Intimacy with God (Part 1)

(Part 1)

Chapter 7

Intimacy with God (Part 2)

(Part 2)

About the Author

Notes

To my wife, First Lady Mireille Pierre-Louis Gay, I praise the Lord for using you to teach and inspire me not to just finish this project but finish every work that the Lord requires of me in the future. Your drive and tenacity inspire me to push harder than ever for greatness. He used you, your patience, and your unconditional love to bring me out of deep darkness and depression; and I am forever grateful to the Lord for bringing you into my life when I needed you most. You have all my heart, love, and gratitude forever.

To my former wife of twenty-nine years, Prophetess and Pastor Elaine Martin Gay, whom the Lord used to encourage and teach me by example how to share His unconditional love with others. She passed and went to be with the Lord on August 8, 2021, which left me heartbroken. I know you are cheerleading for me to complete this work that you were a vital part of from its inception. To my surprise, the Lord decided to bless me with my current wife to help me restore my life and get this book across the finish line.

Introduction

Prayer for the believer is pivotal. Those who believe understand that prayer is communication with God, but most will admit that their prayer life needs improvement. Many are secretly distressed over their prayer relationship with God. They have prayed consistently and experience limited or no results at all. Therefore, they have decided that the time to pray is when they are in trouble or when life throws them a curveball. For many, frustration and even resentment have developed within the heart of their spirits toward God. They love God, but often feel that He does not care about their everyday circumstances. Often, they feel that the little things happening in their lives are too trivial for a God who is so busy dealing with huge issues. However, they hope that He cares about the major moments in their lives. As a result, many are literally holding on to their relationship with God by a thread. If one more prayer request goes unanswered, they may completely turn away from God. Unfortunately, churches all over America and the world are full of people with this experience and mindset. They have not considered that unanswered prayer is not an indictment against God but against their lack of understanding concerning prayer. Many do not understand or realize that God will not violate His Word just to answer their prayer. His Word is more valuable to Him than His name.¹ Therefore, we have a dilemma when it comes to prayer. We do not want to come out and say that it is God's fault that all our prayers are not being answered, and we do not want to blame ourselves either.

The challenge that many in the faith have is that they know others who seem to always get every prayer answered. Although they try to show joy and support for them when they are bragging on what God has done in their lives, they still find themselves irritated because their personal testimony is that God never seems to answer their prayers. Instead of them getting closer to God, often this frustration propels them further from God. Their failure to understand the plethora of Scriptures revealing God's desire to have an intimate relationship with them only exacerbates the situation.² Therefore, they tend to view Christianity as a bunch of rules to keep, and then they tell themselves why try to keep all these rules when it is obvious that God does not care