Question 4: "Why do we have to pray if God knows what we need anyway?"
Right enough, the Bible says that God knows what we need before we ask him. So is there any point in praying? Surely, if he cares about us, he'll give us what we need anyway. Won't he?
Here are three important things to bear in mind.
No, he sees everything that happens to us. Several centuries before Jesus, the Jewish people were already aware of this. One of the Psalms declares,
I look up to the mountains;
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Jesus said that not a sparrow falls to the ground without God knowing about it... and then he said, "And you are of more value than many sparrows." You have God's full attention, all the time. So in prayer, you aren't telling him anything he doesn't know already.
Indeed, he knows more
about us than anybody else does.
In some religions, right enough, everything depends on approaching the gods in the right way. Your offering has to be absolutely perfect... you have to use exactly the right incantation or magic spell... you can only come at certain times of year, or when the moon is full, or whatever.
Christianity isn't like that. God loves to hear his people reach out to him, and it doesn't matter how they do it. That's the whole point of Jesus' story about the Prodigal Son (read it here if you're unfamiliar with it); the boy had no right to expect anything from his Father and yet he was instantly welcomed back. So prayer isn't something God requires before he's willing to listen.
In fact, there are places in the Bible where God promises he's going to help people before they even ask:
“I’ve made myself available
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So why do we need to pray? Why does God want it to happen?
Prayer is God's way of inviting us to be part of his action on our behalf. If you have kids, you wouldn't deny them anything they needed; but sometimes it's nice to be asked! When your eight-year-old just helps himself from the fridge, without saying anything, you might wonder whether he really appreciates the way you provide for him. And when it's his birthday, a lot of the joy for you comes in watching his face as he unwraps his presents and you see his delight.
So God doesn't just silently and unobtrusively supply our needs, as if he were some sort of efficient machine. He could do that, and often he gives us what we need anyway, without waiting to be asked. But he wants us to pray, because that makes several good things happen.
(a) We're reminded about where it's all coming from, and we start to feel more conscious of him, and grateful for his faithfulness.
(b) That encourages us to trust him more, and ask him for more because we are growing in confidence with him.
(c) God is thrilled that people he loves are responding to him and starting to develop their relationship to him.
(d) We learn to see more and more of his plans for us, as he grants us some of our requests, says No to others, and makes us wait when we aren't ready.
(e) We start to pray for others too, and that increases our sensitivity and love for them, and gives us more insight into the needs of our world.
And there's much more. But when you boil it down, it comes to one simple answer: God wants us to pray because he wants us to know him, and live in a trusting relationship with him.