For Christmas, one of you very thoughtfully gifted me a collection of prayers from the early church, and I’ve chosen to work through it as one of my daily spiritual disciplines in 2023. It is already proving to be a rich experience, but also a convicting one. You see, the prayers of the early church, even with updated language, are quite different from my typical prayers.

Perhaps the biggest difference is there is a lot more of “thee” and a lot less of “me” in their prayers compared to mine. In other words, they spend a lot more time in their prayers praising God for who He is and asking to know Him more, and a lot less time spelling out their personal needs and wants.

I think there is something to this. When we start with and prioritize praising God for who He is we gain a proper perspective on our needs and wants. Oh, we can and should still bring our needs and wants to the Lord, but we do so knowing our all-powerful and all-loving Father will do what is best.

So friends, let me encourage you to have more “thee” and less “me” in your prayers.