Prayer

I just began a relationship with God however I'm having trouble with praying. Am I supposed to hear God when I pray? How do I know if he is listening? Also I only know the Hail Mary and the Our Father so those are the only ones I say so far.

Welcome!

Lord's Prayer

The Lords prayer in the post above is a good guide to what to include in a prayer.

Recognize God's majesty.
Pray that God's plans are realized.
Ask that your needs are met...without treating God as a wish granting genie.
Ask for forgiveness for the things you have done that God does not approve of.
Ask for protection from temptation.

A.good start but not the only things to pray about. Prayer is just a respectful but honest conversation with God. There is no "correct" prayer. Tell God what's going on (he already knows anyway) and ask for guidance, peace, recognize his amazing nature, thank him, just talk to him about the things that matter to him.

And spend some quiet time in His presence. You will eventually start to get some answers to prayer and when you do, return to prayer to thank Him.

You may hear the voice of God. But my experience is that most often, after spending time in prayer about something every day one of three things happen: (1)I am goven confidence and understanding that the answer is no or not now. (2)I am given confidence about what course of action I should take, or (3)God solves the problem in some way I never imagined but it's now solved.

But mostly, just spend time talking to God in your own way and time quietly resting in his presence every day.

Look, praying is simply a conversation with God, as if you were talking to a friend. You praise him, you tell him your fears, desires, worries. You ask him for inner peace and to change what he believes should change in you, to help you grow spiritually. You confess and ask him to forgive your sins, if you think it is necessary to do so. If you have any special request, you ask him to do it according to his will, you praise him again if you want. Talk to him with complete confidence, he always listens to our prayers, even if sometimes it seems like he doesn't. Some of the Psalms are a very good example of prayer, I recommend reading them all.
As for listening to it when you pray. You won't always hear it. God communicates in very different ways, most often through his word in the Bible. Learning to listen to God is a little more complicated, but it is something that develops little by little. It is very important to read the Bible, so you learn about the character of God and the way he works.

Okay! Thank you!!

Hello @Babycherub, first off, welcome to CChat! I'm glad that you found us and joined in the discussions with us

As far as prayer goes, here are a few things that may be helpful. For instance, for your official times of prayer (a time or times during the day that we set apart to pray, IOW), following a pattern of prayer can help keep you focused, and the "pattern" that I typically follow is this one:
Here's a short explanations about the ACTS model or pattern for prayer, and a bit more about how to pray.

Finally, here is a more thorough look at the topic of prayer for Christians who are still pretty new to the faith from a 4-part teaching series called, Spiritual Boot Camp.
You may also want to check out the other three parts of this teaching series, How to Study the Scriptures, How to Function in the Body (Fellowship), and How to Witness as time allows. Just go here: Spiritual Boot Camp, scroll down a bit, and click on whichever part of the series that you'd like to listen and/or read online (all four parts of the teaching series are free to stream online, just FYI).

Just FYI, this series takes a close look at four of our most important Christian spiritual disciplines, 1) How to Study the Scriptures 2) How to Pray 3) How to Function in the Body (Fellowship) 4) How to Witness. The series will not only help you understand each of them and why they are important to us a believers, it will also help you understand the best practical ways to apply them to your daily walk as a believer

(I went through this series about 35 years ago and there are a number of things that I learned back then that I still use in my walk today)

God bless you!! (Numbers 6:24-26)

~Deuteronomy (David)

Hello again @Babycherub, I should also mention the fact that prayer is the way that we communicate with/talk to God throughout the day (typically, in this case, in a far less official or structured way). Believe it our not, our transcendent God, the King and Creator of the Universe, wants to be part of our everyday lives. IOW, He wants us to know Him, and He wants to know us too, personally, so be sure to begin to include Him going forward in everything that you do througout the day

Some have referred to this as, "practicing the presence of God" in our lives, a practice that is summed up best in the following passage,
While this idea probably seems daunting to you right now (how do we, "pray w/o ceasing", for instance), it won't seem that way for long if you do this: begin by looking for little things throughout your day to rejoice in and thank Him for, even the simplest of things. Then, before you know it, you will find yourself talking (praying) to Him regularly all day long

May God bless you as you seek to know and understand Him more and more each day, especially the deep and everlasting love that He, your loving, heavenly Father (or "Abba") has for you as His adopted daughter

~Deuteronomy (David)
p.s. - another way that we pray is by responding to Him about what we are reading in the Bible (rejoicing in and thanking Him for the things that we learn, and by asking Him questions about something that seems unclear, etc).

Please read the Speech by Jesus made on the mount.. So many false teachings can be avoided if one actually reads the teachings of Jesus..

Jesus said about prayer::

(Matthew 6:5-7) "¶ And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. {6} But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. {7} But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking."

So repitious prayers should not be used.. The Hail Mary is the very example of a repitious prayer.. So don't say it.. And it is not being said to God but to another human being.. Thats an example of a seanse trying to contact the dead..

Also Jesus said about the ""Our Father"" that it was the manor in which we should pray.. Not the exat words..

(Matthew 6:9) "After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name."

The best prayer is one that comes from the heart.. One in which you say exactly what you need to say in your own words.. Prayer is in effect talking to God.. So say what ever you think you need to say.. Talk to The LORD as if you are talking to a Loving Father..

P: praise
R: request
A: admit
Y: you

this one was reccomended to me at a teen camp.

have you heard this one?
B: basic
I: instructions
B: before
L: leaving
E: earth.

so all the unsaved? just operating without the istructions manual.

I take prayer super casual, and I'll probably get backlash, but it makes it easier to pray regularly an makes it more comfortable.
an example prayer is (don't judge me);
Hey Man, thanks for what you did, I will never take that for granted. Would you mind protecting Babycherub? thanks for all you do, man. please protect me from myself, also, and help me to take more time with you. amen.

"Quiet times with a spiritual heart often brings words to mind."

Thank you!

This is a great prayer!

Oh thank you I did not know that! 😧

Can I ask if you're not supposed to say repeated prayers then why do they say them in church?

It can seem daunting at first, but prayer is nothing more than a conversation with a friend. Sometimes we get the idea that prayer must follow some form or include certain words and phrases. We feel somewhat intimidated because others seem to have prayers roll easily off the tongue and seem very full of religious phrases. And while there is nothing wrong with any of that if it is from the heart, the very best prayers are simply an ongoing conversation with your Friend.
Learn all you can about prayer. E. M. Bounds has written volumes about it. But in the end, he would tell you to just be yourself and be honest with God.

This if from the Screwtape letters by cs Lewis.

MY DEAR WORMWOOD, subject of prayer. You might have spared the comment that my advice about his prayers for his mother it "proved singularly unfortunate". The best thing, where it is possible, is to keep the patient from the serious intention of praying altogether. When the patient is an adult recently re-converted to the Enemy's party, like your man, this is best done by encouraging him to remember, or to think he remembers, the parrot-like nature of his prayers in childhood. In reaction against that, he may be persuaded to aim at something entirely spontaneous, inward, informal, and unregularised; and what this will actually mean to a beginner will be an effort to produce in himself a vaguely devotional mood in which real concentration of will and intelligence have no part. One of their poets, Coleridge, has recorded that he did not pray "with moving lips and bended knees" but merely "composed his spirit to love" and indulged "a sense of supplication". That is exactly the sort of prayer we want; and since it bears a superficial resemblance to the prayer of silence as practiced by those who are very far advanced in the Enemy's service, clever and lazy patients can be taken in by it for quite a long time.

At the very least, they can be persuaded that the bodily position makes no difference to their prayers; for they constantly forget, what you must always remember, that they are animals and that whatever their bodies do affects their souls. It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out. If this fails, you must fall back on a subtler misdirection of his intention.

Whenever they are attending to the Enemy Himself we are defeated,...But of course the Enemy will not meantime be idle. Wherever there is prayer, there is danger of His own immediate action. He is cynically indifferent to the dignity of His position, and ours, as pure spirits, and to human on their knees He pours out self-knowledge. if ever he consciously directs his prayers "Not to what I think thou art but to what thou knowest thyself to be", our situation is, for the moment, desperate. Once all his thoughts and images have been flung aside or, if retained, retained with a full recognition of their merely subjective nature, and the man trusts himself to the completely real, external, invisible Presence, there with him in the room and never knowable by him as he is known by it—why, then it is that the incalculable may occur.