Enthusiastically, Dawn

Here we are – the fourth Wednesday of Journaling in January 2025. I hope you have found at least one useable journaling point of entry. If you missed any of the posts and prompts, head over to the Journaling in January page: HERE!

Today we will focus on praying and journaling. I have found journaling helps me fine-tune my prayer life and also allows me to focus on praying thoroughly.

I believe prayer is a deliberate act of rebellion in a world determined to eliminate its maker. Is this how you think about prayer? Do you give any thought to prayer, your prayer life, your relationship with the God who is your maker? If you are here, I bet you do!

Are you willing to consider how journaling can support your prayer life? If so, I’d like to share a few thoughts about how journaling facilitates my prayer life, and intimacy with my Creator.

Before we begin, I would ask you to put away your preconceived ideas about journaling, and maybe even praying for a bit, open yourself to the possibilities presented, and the potential to pray with your pen, and to consider new ways to deepen your relationship with God.

How is your prayer life? Is it passionate, honest, bold? Is it fervent, faithful, and fearless? Is it weak, more of a whisper than a confident conversation? Do you find yourself unsure of what to say to God? Do you pray inconstantly, mostly when you are upset or stressed or burdened with a problem? Or do you flee from prayer when you feel threatened by the circumstances you know should drive you to your knees?

Do you see prayer as an ideal exercise, something to be performed? Do you judge your prayers, or criticise the prayers of others? Do you find yourself struggling at times for the words to come out?

Well, however your prayer life is right now, I believe it can be improved through journaling. Not in a way that is burdensome, but in a straightforward way that helps unleash your confidence and trust in God, while minimizing distractions. Journaling can only support what is there. Like soil where seeds are planting. The soil is the place where the seed will take root, but other things are needed for effective growth, such as the sun, and water.

Let’s consider specific ways journaling or a journal could support your prayer focus with a few suggestions to try. I am not suggesting a whole huge prayer binder, a specific prayer format, or some fancy prayer journal but instead to start where you are simply, with your current journal, a Bible, and your praying heart, mind, spirit and soul.

Prayer Prompt One: The Disciple’s Prayer

As I consider The Book of Matthew, chapter 6, verse 6 reads:

 But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. (NET)

There is a sense of great intimacy here. You and God. Alone. No distractions. As Jesus goes on instructing the disciples how to pray, he begins the prayer we all know so well.

Pray then like this:

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

Matthew 6:9-13 (NET)

Then the verses follow 14-15: For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

Herein lies the greatest prayer prompt one can pray, like a precious template outlining our way to talk with the One, True, Living God!

But the beauty is (as we may know already), Jesus did not give this to be prayed by rote, but as a way to approach the throne of grace He secured with His sacrificial death on the cross! Herein lies the freedom and beauty of prayer…that we can approach God boldly, briefly, and even brazenly with our praises, requests, and honest longings. We can take this template and allow ourselves to move through the structure of prayer with our own words.

If you haven’t tried this before, set a timer (if that helps you) for 7 minutes. Try to springboard off of these as you feel led- I have just offered some alternatives, but you go ahead and create your own:

Dear Father in Heaven…

Lord, You are Holy…

Help me to recognize your Kingdom has come despite…

May Your will be done in these ways…

On earth as it is in Heaven, I pray your will be done in my life and the lives of…

Lord, give me today my daily bread, and show me what it is to be satisfied wholly with what you give…

Give me what I need today, and cause me to rejoice…

Forgive me my sins…

Show me anyone I hold anything against, in the quiet lead me to forgive them…

Lord, I am tempted, but ask for your grace and strength in these weaknesses …

Lord, deliver me from evil, and protect me from the distractions and strategies of the enemy…

Remind me daily of my need for Jesus and may I daily remind myself of His great sacrifice for my very own redemption. Write yourself a gospel truth or praise expressing the truth of the gospel to yourself- in essence: Preach the gospel to yourself! We need it every day, lest we grow cool.

Prayer Prompt 2: Praying alongside Psalms

Some of you may recall one Summer I shared my journey praying through Psalms. I used a scripture journal which had blank pages interleaved throughout the book of the psalms. It was a special season of prayer for sure and a blessing to me. You do not need anything but your current notebook/journal to begin integrating the Psalms into your prayer life. The Psalms lend themselves well to praying, as they are prayers, and songs which help us in our own prayer journey.

Try this: Open your prayer time each morning with a portion of Psalms. Begin with Psalm 1, and travel through at a pace that seems good to you. As you read through the Psalm, you can use the Psalm itself to springboard into prayer, or as you read and listen for God’s word for you, respond to the specific verses that speak to your heart today.

Some of the imagery in the Psalms will lend itself well to prayer, and some things will feel less like they resonate. But with patience, diligence and the help of the Holy Spirit as you sit with the Psalms, an open journal and your pen, I believe you will find words to pray from your own heart as God’s word begins to root itself there deeply.

“Deep in our psyches we want an experience with God or an experience in prayer. Once we make that our quest, we lose God. You don’t experience God; you get to know him. You submit to him. You enjoy him. He is after all, a person.”

Paul E. Miller

Prayer Prompt 3: Getting to Know God through Journaling

So why do I think a journal is helpful as I seek God? Well first I do not journal every single prayer, but I pray through and from the journal. I go back and forth between my praying- talking to God out loud, or silently as I sit with scripture, and I also find the act of writing actually helps facilitate the quieting of my heart. The writing slows me down. Slows down my racing mind, my busy thoughts…the act of writing helps me BE STILL, and KNOW …in quietness, and stillness the God who is willing to know me!

Whether I am sitting with a devotional book, my Bible, or Bible Study, I remind myself that I am meeting with a person. This is my act of faith. This requires the request, from Psalms 119: “Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law”. The Lord is willing to meet with us.

I confess mostly, I open my journal with the same statement, “Here I am Lord…” and I wait. I approach the page as if I am writing to a person, who sits with me, and who sees me fully. Who is with me, yet also is in me. Who knows my thoughts, yet knows my need to express them, and to be heard.

How else do we get to know this God we claim to belong to unless we make an effort to attend to Him, to give our attention fully to Him. We lavish our attention on so many lesser things, whether we are willing to admit it or not. What time do we offer God, out of the twenty-four hours He gives us each day?

As I write, I find myself focused more readily on the unseen realm. The pen draws me into the quiet place my heart longs to be. It does not need to take a long time, and certainly we want to be sensitive and open to how the Lord wants to be present with us. Here is where the Holy Bible is most completely able to provide what we need. As I study, read, meditate and pray, the Lord makes His way to my restless heart and mind, and speaks a much needed truth, or reveals something about himself or humanity to me. I write it in my journal (most times) and have opportunity to respond in thanksgiving and prayer.

I also find that as I sit with my open journal, Bible and pen, the Lord does bring to mind people to pray for, this leads us to our next prompt, intercessory prayer.

Prayer Prompt 4: Creatively Interceding for Others

One of the ways I sometimes enjoy bringing others before the Lord in prayer is through mind mapping or clustering. Sometimes I just write a list, but more usually as I pray in my journals for others, I will write their name followed by a prayer. Sometimes, I will do prayer clusters…it works well when you have a number of people to pray for, and you can just springboard off the mind-map or prayer cluster you create. Works especially well for families, or other people connected to someone you may be praying for that comes to mind as you pray for the person. This is also a visual, and for those who appreciate a visual prompt it can be really helpful. You can use colored pens if that helps you.

Although I have used a number of prayer journals along the way, I have found the best way for me, is to keep it simple. I have had seasons using more elaborate (and effective for a season) prayer journals or formats for praying on paper, but truly the simplest way is the one that does not hinder you from connecting with God. I find approaching God on paper helps me approach God in prayer in all circumstances. And isn’t that the ultimate goal?

Create a Prayer Custer: Begin by writing your name in a circle. From there begin to draw lines to connections you have such as family, friends, community, church, etc. You can do a different prayer cluster for different days of the week, or just create one for special prayer times or focused prayer for groups of people. Try it and see if it is a helpful prayer prompt for your journaling quiet time.

Prayer Prompt 5: Daily/Weekly Letters to God

Here is a challenge for the next 7 days (or every other day?). Write a letter to God whether in the morning, or night. This is a helpful approach to prayer because we all have written letters at some point in our lives. Whether we had to write thank you notes when we were kids for gifts from distant relatives or the more formal thanksgivings that came as we became adults. Either way, a letter, or thank you note, if you like, to God could help you better connect with the God of the universe who is yet mindful of you. Will you give it a try? Don’t overthink it, keep it simple. Write your daily letter to God. Don’t worry about the length, but just think about what you want to tell Him about this day!

Alternately you could try a weekly letter for a month. Each week, perhaps at week’s end, you could write a letter to good giving thanks for all that took place. You could incorporate a prayer bullet list of people you encountered and use that as a springboard for prayer. You could include a prayer for the week ahead, and write of lessons and times you felt or experienced God’s presence, peace, or power when in nature, with others or in quiet times of meditation or Bible study.

I hope you will give one of these prayer prompts a try. I find, simply journaling to God about…well, just about everything, helps me know Him, and hear Him better than I would if I did not journal.

Do you have a special way of connecting with God through prayer journaling? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below!

Thank you for reading!

Please check out my book, Journaling for Discovery and Delight – Creative Prompts for Your Journey for more inspiring ways to approach the blank page!