Does anybody else struggle with their prayer life? Or is it just me?
Growing up in the church, I’ve heard countless sermons and teachings on how to pray. The importance of praising God first. The seriousness of admitting your sins and asking for forgiveness. The significance of standing in the gap for those around us.
But finding the time to pray can be difficult. And praying in the “correct way” can be challenging as well.
In addition, so often I would tell friends that I’d pray for them and then forget to do it. And then the feelings of guilt would come when I saw them and suddenly remembered their prayer request.
It can be overwhelming.
For several years now, I have carried around an index card in my Bible or in my car with prayer requests written on it. I divided the index card into days with specific prayer requests for each day. And while this method has worked fairly well, an index card is pretty small so I eventually began to run out of room.
That’s when I discovered a video showing how to put together a prayer journal.
I realize that I may have lost some of you with the word journal. I get it. I do love to journal and I often write my feelings and prayers down but I know that most people don’t love journaling. However, a prayer journal is different. Let me show you how.
First of all, it’s a way to keep all your prayer requests in one place. People ask for prayer all the time, whether it’s at work, or by text, or at church. And if I don’t have a central location to write everything down, I will never remember to pray for those specific requests.
Secondly, it’s simple to put together. All you need is a journal and some sticky tabs. I ordered my journal from Paper Sunday (which I recently featured in one of my favorite things post). I love the Paper Sunday journals because they feature a personalized scripture at the bottom of each page, but you can use any journal or notebook. 
Third, you use sticky tabs to divide your prayer journal into the following sections:
- Attributes of God
- Monday
- Tuesday
- Wednesday
- Thursday
- Friday
- Saturday Praises
In the Attributes of God section, you list different characteristics of God along with scripture references. Then, each day when you pray, begin by praising Him for one or more of those attributes. This has been so helpful for me because I tend to forget to praise Him or only praise Him for one or two things. But when I see ALL of the Lord’s attributes written out, I find myself becoming more in awe of His glory and power.
Then for each daily tab, you list specific requests to pray over each day. Right now I have 5-7 requests listed each day, which feels more doable than praying 35 things every day. I also leave a line or two between each request so I can write down how the Lord answers each request.
On the Saturday Praises, page, you can list praises that you have throughout the week. It could be as simple as the fact that you had a good day, or as big as someone being healed from cancer. I also try to list any answered prayers on that page as well. It’s a good reminder for me that God loves me and hears my prayers and petitions.
One recommendation that I will make is that you leave a blank page or two between each tab for additional requests throughout the year. That way you don’t have to make new tabs later.
I hope this has been encouraging for you and will be helpful in your own prayer life. It has worked great so far for me!