How To Pray For Your Needs According To Scripture

One question that I am asked most often is how to pray for your needs, especially when it involves healing. There is a multitude of scriptures regarding healing or anything else we need from God. 

I encourage you to search the scriptures and when one (or more) jumps out or comes alive in your spirit, apply that to your need.  God will always lead you to His Word that applies to your situation. 

To illustrate that, read Proverbs 4:20 – 22 which says, “Give attention to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. Do not let them from your eyes; keep them in the midst of your heart. For they are life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh.” 

How To Pray For Your Needs

Let’s break that passage of scripture down to better understand how it applies to healing – or any need we may have.

1. Attend To My Words

When we find the scriptures that address our needs, we must ATTEND to them.

Focus on them.

When you attend to something, your focus is wholly on that. You attend to your job. You attend to your family. You attend to the job at hand.

You don’t allow yourself to be distracted because your focus is on the job at hand. 

2. Incline Your Ear

When you are intent on hearing something you need to hear, you may cup your hand around your ear to block out any other noise.

Try it – you will see how much clearer you hear.

Sometimes you may lean in or bend down to be sure you hear clearly.

3. Keep Them In Front Of You

This is crucial. Do not allow those words to depart from your sight. Keep them in front of you. Write out the scriptures and refer to them whenever doubt tries to rob you of the truth.

This helps you to ward off the lies and anything else that may be contrary to the promise in the Word.

4. Meditate On Them

Meditate on those verses. Think about them. Say them out loud. The original translation for the word ‘meditate’ used in this verse is the same Hebrew word that is used to describe a cow chewing his cud.  

A cow will chew on his food, swallow it, and then bring it up again and chew on it SOME MORE. 

Why Do We Need To Do These?

The answer is at the end of the verse: These words are LIFE to those who find them and HEALTH to their flesh.

It could not be any clearer. God’s Word is health to our flesh. When we pray the answer that is already in the Bible and refuse to doubt, we will see the manifestation of that promise for our needs.

When we listen to the lies thrown at us – no matter where they are coming from – how can we hear what God is saying to us? When we listen to what God is saying to us – the lies end. They have no foundation. 

Praying the answer instead of the problem puts us in a position of belief. We are praying God’s own Word back to Him, thanking Him for that answer. It builds our faith and brings us to a place of assurance instead of doubt.

It Is Not Hoping; It Is Believing

Have you ever heard the expression ‘hope and pray?’ Are you hoping God will heal you? Are you hoping a difficult situation will turn around?

The Bible gives us promises. 

When we pray the promise, we are praying God’s words back to Him. We are thanking Him that his Word is true. He cannot lie.

When we are aware that the answer to our situation is already promised in the Word of God, it is easy to pray that promise, to believe that promise, and to thank God for His promise. There is a huge difference between hoping and praying or praying and knowing.

We do not necessarily pray about many things in our life that occur daily such as:

“I hope it doesn’t rain tomorrow.”

“I hope I get there on time in this traffic.”

These are normal things we hope for. But when we say we are hoping and praying, we are contradicting the Word.

If we have prayed in faith for healing, then we do not have to hope God heard us or that He will answer. He has already established His will regarding our healing in His Word.

Our job is to believe it, not waver in our faith, and thank Him for answering our prayers.