Experience the Joy and Life-Changing Power of Praying Scripture

Mindy Ferguson knows the value and benefit of praying Scripture, and today we’ll get a glimpse into the dimly lit storage closet where she gathered with treasured sisters-in-Christ and first learned to pray using God’s Word. If you’ve never prayed using God’s own Word, let this be your invitation — it might just change the way you pray forever. It’s a joy to welcome Mindy to the farm’s table today…

Guest Post by Mindy Ferguson

Early in my ministry journey, I team-taught a women’s Sunday school class.

One of the women on our teaching team was gifted at what I considered to be an elusive art form called prayer.

She offered to lead the teaching team in a weekly prayer time before church on Sunday mornings. Desperate for a deeper connection with God, I agreed.

“We praised God using words from Scripture and transformed verse after verse into requests and expressions of heartfelt thanks.“

The four of us met in a small, dimly lit storage closet located in a rarely used area of our church’s fellowship hall. Pushing aside rows of unfolded chairs and multiple stacks of communion supply boxes, we made a small open space in the middle of the tile floor, set up four metal chairs, and then closed the heavy double doors of that tiny, stuffy storeroom.

My now treasured friend and long-time prayer partner opened her well-worn Bible. I silently admired the pages filled with scribbled notes in the margins and lines of Bible text that were emphasized by colorful highlighting. She laid her Bible across her lap as she began to lead us in Scripture-based prayer. That morning a bond of sisterhood started between the four of us. We praised God using words from Scripture and transformed verse after verse into requests and expressions of heartfelt thanks.

My prayer life was forever changed.

I gathered with those three women in that little storage closet on Sunday mornings, week after week, for several years. That storeroom became for us a throne room of sorts where four wives, mothers, teachers, and God-followers turned the ancient words of Scripture into beautiful, powerful prayers that seemed to speak to our every modern-day need.

There is power in praying God’s Word.

“For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires” (Hebrews 4:12, NLT). Praying Scripture enables us to cut through the flowery facades that often veil our innermost desires, not only exposing our motives but transforming them so that we pray in agreement with God’s will. And when women pray God’s Word over each other, a sense of community forms. We begin to believe that God will indeed move in those women’s lives. We watch expectantly for evidence of his active presence at work answering our prayers. Amazing transformations of perspectives and hearts (and lives!) take place when women pray for women.

Today, praying Scripture is part of my regular Bible-reading routine. For example, this morning I was reading Jeremiah chapter 17 in the New Living Translation and these verses caught my attention:

“But blessed are those who trust in the Lord and have made the Lord their hope and confidence. They are like trees planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Such trees are not bothered by the heat or worried by long months of drought. Their leaves stay green, and they never stop producing fruit” (verses 7-8).

“Scripture-based prayers change my perspective, focus my attention on God’s unchanging character, and remind me that his purposes are so much better than my plans.“

I paused my reading and immediately began to pray, “Lord, help me remember that, even when I feel discouraged or inadequate, you are the source of my hope and my confidence. I so want to be fruitful in my work and thrive every day like a tree that is planted along a riverbank, with roots that reach deep into the water. Lord, give me the incredible blessing of bearing fruit that glorifies you in every season and in every setting.”

Praying Scripture, especially out loud, enables me to feel a greater connection with the one who inspired those words. That connection helps me pry my fingers loose from my own plans and more openly seek God’s will as I trust him to work and move in my everyday, ordinary circumstances.

When I am fearful, God’s Word reminds me that he ultimately “rules over everything” (Psalm 103:19, NLT).

When I need wisdom, I “ask our generous God” and thank him for the assurance that he will give me the wisdom I seek (James 1:5, NLT).

When I feel anxious and struggle to be at peace, God’s Word reminds me to pray with gratitude for all that God has done, and when I do, I “experience God’s peace” that protects my heart (Philippians 4:6-7, NLT).

Scripture-based prayers change my perspective, focus my attention on God’s unchanging character, and remind me that his purposes are so much better than my plans.

“Praying Scripture has deepened my relationship with God and infused my prayers with a hopeful sense of expectation that God will work in my circumstances and accomplish his good purposes through my life.“

I am thankful that I had the opportunity so many years ago to practice praying Scripture with dear friends as we served and did life together. More than twenty years later, I still feel a special bond with those three women. We are all still serving God, although now in different roles and seasons of life. Through text messages, emails, and phone calls, the four of us have prayed for one another through heart-rending losses, health scares, geographical moves and difficult transitions, concerns for our children, and the joyous births of grandchildren. Two of us are now living in different cities and we all attend different churches, but the sisterhood formed by praying God’s Word together is still as strong as the day we first cleared a space for prayer in the middle of that dimly lit storage closet.

You may already have a rich and meaningful connection with God. Or, like I was that Sunday morning as I first met with friends to pray in the storage closet turned throne room, you may be desperate for a deeper connection with him. Either way, incorporating God’s Word into your heartfelt prayers for yourself and others will add depth to your prayers and cause you to internalize the meaning of those God-inspired words. Like me, your prayer life just may be forever changed.

Praying Scripture has deepened my relationship with God and infused my prayers with a hopeful sense of expectation that God will work in my circumstances and accomplish his good purposes through my life.

Mindy Ferguson is the Senior Acquisitions Editor for Bibles at Tyndale House Ministries. She is passionate about creating meaningful resources that engage God’s people in the Scriptures and Mindy finds great joy in serving God with fellow believers at Tyndale as well as at her local church.

This year I am excited to pray God’s Word using a new prayer journal: Every Woman’s Prayer Journal. This beautiful full-color journal is divided into four sections with 25 prayer sessions in each. These sections reflect the process I go through when I pray Scripture: Connect, Trust, Reflect, and Become. The journal guides you through a focused time of Scripture-inspired prayer to add depth and intentionality to your prayer time. Each day’s prayer journaling session includes space for writing out praises, confessions, thanksgiving, and requests. The Every Woman’s Prayer Journal features 100 encouraging Scriptures organized by topics from the Every Woman’s Bible, making this a great journal to use alongside the Bible. Learn more at EveryWomansBible.com.

{Our humble thanks to Tyndale Bibles for their partnership in today’s devotional.}