How do you pray? Mary and Martha give us a great example in John 11:3, which was the theme of my sermon last week.

What we learn in John 11:1 is that Lazarus, the brother of Mary and Martha, was sick, so his sisters sent word to Jesus. That is prayer: sending word to Jesus.

I think it is worth noting both what they said and what they didn’t say. All they said is, “Lord, the one you love is sick.”

In terms of what they said, first note that they address Jesus as Lord. They recognize he is Lord over sickness and them and everything else. But that doesn’t hinder their prayers because notice the second thing they say: “the one you love…” You see, they knew that Jesus loved their brother and that He loved them, so it makes them bold to approach Him and remind Him of His love. Finally, they simply state the need or issue, which is that Lazarus is sick.

This leads to what they didn’t say or ask. They didn’t tell Jesus what to do in terms of coming or healing or anything but rather they trusted that as their loving Lord He would do what was best.

And so I think this simple model of recognizing that Jesus is Lord, remembering that he loves us and stating our need is a great way to pray.