General prayers aren’t the worst thing in the world. In fact, they can save lives, bring comfort, and change outcomes for people we don’t even know.
Many years ago, I heard a sermon about how we should pray for specific requests instead of just generalizing our prayer times. I think the point was to avoid things like, “God, bless everyone I know, Amen,” or using a cop-out like, “Thy will be done,” instead of pressing to know what God’s will is in any given situation. (To which I say: There are times when “Thy will be done” is a great prayer, especially when we simply don’t know what to pray. Even Jesus prayed it – but when He said it, He was surrendering to a known outcome (Luke 22:42). In the midst of surrender, we can – and should – still be seeking God to know His will that we’re asking to be done.) And so, for the last 20 years or so, I’ve strived to pray in specifics for specific people.
Prayer is the opportunity to know the heart of God. Yes, we can (and possibly should) pray for the outcome we want to see, especially when someone requests that we pray for a specific outcome. But when we partner with Him in the specifics, we learn how He sees our world, how He sees people, and what we can do to be Christlike on earth.
Praying in the specifics is fun, but I’ve come to realize recently that we need to pray general prayers, as well. When Jesus was praying in Gethsemane, He said, “My prayer is not for [the disciples] alone. I pray for those who will believe in me…” (John 17:20). He was praying for all believers who would come after the disciples. That’s a pretty general and all-inclusive prayer!
We’re allowed – and probably should – pray generally for people. It could be any group: parents, moms with rebellious teens, workers in a local court system, children from non-Christian homes, pastors, teachers, highway workers, bank tellers, dads with daughters, trail crews, you name it. The thing is to take the group, find God’s heart on it, and then to pray that heart over the group. It doesn’t have to be grand and glorious. I’ve been known to pray simply that God will love on them today.
When we pray for these unknown people, we’re filling in a gap for them. We’re bringing the heart of God for them into their lives – especially when they don’t have others who can pray for them (or who can/do pray, but not on that topic). This can change lives, outcomes, and much, much more.
You never know when you just might be the recipient of some of those general prayers – and how much those general prayers have played a role in where you are today. The church really is a body with many members, and these general prayers are just the body parts strengthening the other parts of the body, whether they’re aware of the specific body part or not.
