He Prayed for Me

The gospels make it clear that Jesus prayed.  How often and when did Jesus pray?  Steve Shirley answers that question on his Jesus Alive website:

The Bible tells us in (1 Th 5:17) to "pray without ceasing." While I don't believe this literally means to never stop praying, I would say that Jesus probably came closer to never stopping than any person who has ever lived on this planet. He was continually in a prayer mode. He is shown to pray: alone (Matt 14:23) (Mark 1:35) (Luke 9:18) (Luke 22:39-41), in public (John 11:41-42) (John 12:27-30), before meals (Matt 26:26) (Mark 8:6) (Luke 24:30) (John 6:11), before important decisions (Luke 6:12-13), before healing (Mark 7:34-35), after healing (Luke 5:16), to do the Father's will (Matt 26:36-44), among other things. He also taught on the importance of prayer (Matt 21:22) (Mark 11:24-26) (Matt 7:7-11) (Luke 11:9-13) (John 14:13-14) (John 15:7,16) (John 16:23-24) (Matt 5:44)(Luke 6:27-28) (Matt 6:5-15: including the Lord's Prayer) (Luke 11:2-4) (Matt 18:19-20).

My January 1 post highlighted Jim Elliff's preferred method for reading the Bible.  He recommends saturating or immersing yourself in one book by reading and re-reading it numerous times.  I chose the Gospel of John and am reading it through each week.  I've found John 17 to be one of my favorite chapters. My NKJV divides this chapter into three sections:  Jesus Prays for Himself, Jesus Prays for His Disciples and Jesus Prays for All Believers.

John 17:20-21 speaks to me on a very personal level. "I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word, that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me."  It's not like I had never read those two verses before; but, for some reason, the Holy Spirit opened my eyes to the wonder of what it says.  Jesus prayed for ME!  Even then he knew everything about me, and he knew the plans he had for me.  

As Steve Shirley mentioned, Jesus was always in "prayer" mode.  I am not even close to "always" in prayer mode, more like "occasionally" or "reluctantly" in prayer mode.  There's so much I need to learn about praying and following Jesus' example is John 17 is a great place to start.