Prayer is all about having faith that God hears us

"Lord, teach us to pray."

- Luke 11:1 (AMP)

Did you pray for something today? Or did you believe that your prayers really don't make a difference, so you didn't bother?

Do you wonder if God's really hearing you when you pray? Have you ever considered how much power there is behind your prayers? Do you ponder if you really know how to pray?

There's no need to be ashamed if you answered "yes" to any of these questions. Throughout my lifetime, there have been times I wondered these things.

I've been praying since I was a child. I've seen many prayers answered, and some with miraculous results, yet there's times I wondered if God heard my requests.

Over the years, I've studied what the Bible says about prayer. One day I came across a request the disciples made to Jesus: "Lord, teach us to pray."

I liked that request so much that I started praying it for myself, " God, teach me to pray."

Since that time, I've listened to many teachings and read many books on prayer. I discovered that there are many types of prayer. Of all the facts I learned, the most important one was the same thing my mother taught me as a child: to simply express to God the things on my heart. Then, thank him and believe he hears me.

This is known as the simple prayer of faith. I read in the Bible that these prayers can heal our bodies, forgive sins and more.

As a nurse, I enjoyed looking at the scientific aspect of prayer. In one study they placed bacteria in two lab Petri dishes. They prayed over one of the dishes. The one prayed over had slow growth and, in some spots, no growth at all, while the other one filled with bacterial growth.

This was achieved by simple prayer. This next month let's do our own study on prayer. Let's pray for God to bless our finances, heal our bodies, resolve our relationship issues and expand us spiritually, and anything else that's troubling our hearts.

With our faith together, let's expect miraculous results to our prayers.

• Annettee Budzban is a Christian author, speaker, life coach and nurse. She can be contacted at annetteebudzban@aol.com or (847) 543-8413.