How to Pray: A Simple Guide for Normal People

by Pete Greig

All human institutions and organisations, from golf clubs to governments, eventually develop a culture that is greater than the sum of their parts; more powerful than any of the individuals involved.

First, the Bible does indeed teach that there are spiritual powers at work in our world, affecting organisations and cultures as well as individuals. Second, as citizens of heaven we must exercise great discernment so that we can stand against these powers. ‘What you are up against, in being saved’, says the eminent theologian Stanley Hauerwas, ‘is not simply your personal faults and foibles, your petty temptations and peccadilloes:

Paul’s emphasis here is clearly on courageous resistance. There is no licence for that common kind of macho militancy that continually (and unwisely) picks fights with the devil in prayer.

We believed that God in us is greater than the gods of this world (1 John 4:4), and so the team committed themselves to radical levels of integrity and accountability in Ibiza, while celebrating the island’s God-given beauty and the creativity of its culture.

The Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God. (Rom. 8:26–27)

believe that God has led you to this book because he is calling you to pray, not just to deepen your own personal relationship with him, but also so that you can take your place in a vast, global movement far bigger than me, or the 24–7 movement, or any one personality, programme or brand.