10 Prayers God Always Hears
There are 2 thoughts that hold Christians back from powerful prayer. One, you think God only hears the prayers of some people and not yours, and two, you think your prayers aren’t good enough. Wrong! Prayer is a gift that all believers can use to unlock God’s power in their lives, and there is not just one right way to pray. In fact, in today’s video, let me share with you 10 types of prayers God always hears. Enjoy!
Ephesians 6:18 calls believers to pray “with all kinds of prayers and requests” (NIV), telling us there is more than just one way to pray and knowing the different prayer types can drastically enrich your prayer life. So, in today's video, I'm sharing the 10 types of prayer you should know to unlock God’s power in your life.
You will learn:
- 🙏🏽 The 10 types of prayers.
- 📖 Biblical examples of each type.
- 🎉 Why it is important to know more than one way to pray.
But first, I need to note that not all prayers are the same, but all prayers are powerful. This is why I created the prayer personality quiz to help you discover how you uniquely hear from God and best connect with Him. You can take the quiz at prayquiz.com or find the link below because the more we know how to pray, the more we can unlock God’s power in our lives.
1. Prayer of Supplication
So, let’s get right into the 10 types of prayer. The first type of prayer is a prayer of supplication. This is what many would consider the easiest type of prayer because it is the one we’re most familiar with and what we often think of when we think of prayer. A prayer of supplication is simply asking God for what we want. It’s us presenting our requests to Him. We see this type of prayer from Hannah in 2 Samuel Chapter 2 as she pours out her heart to God, revealing her desire for a son.
The important thing to remember about a prayer of supplication is to allow ourselves to be honest and open with God. Sometimes, we can feel like our requests are too small and not important to God or too big and too hard for God. Neither is true. We can trust God with the desires of our hearts because He both cares and is able to move on our behalf.
2. Prayer of Intercession
The second type of prayer is intercessory prayer. This is where we pray on behalf of someone else. The Bible calls us to pray for all of God’s people (Ephesians 6:18), to pray for each other to be healed (James 5:16), and to even pray for our enemies (Matthew 5:44). Romans 8:34 says:
“Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us.” (Romans 8:34 ESV)
Jesus Christ is interceding for us to God, which means He's praying to God on our behalf, and that is what intercessory prayer is.
One thing to keep in mind about intercessory prayer is that it's something that you want to be intentional about. The other day I had a friend who texted me to say I was on her prayer calendar for that day and asked how she might pray for me. It was so thoughtful, but it was so intentional. So let me ask you, who can you be praying for today?
3. Prayer of Thanksgiving
The third type of prayer is a prayer of thanksgiving. Philippians 4:6 says:
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” (Philippians 4:6 ESV)
What I love about this verse is that it shows the peace that can overcome anxiety when we pray and not just praying to present our requests (prayer of supplication), but also to present our thanksgivings. It’s a prayer dedicated to thanking God for what you already have or for what you expect to happen.
We see the Apostle Paul practice gratefulness in prayer in Philippians Chapter 1 where he shares that he thanks God as he remembers his brothers and sisters in Christ.
When we practice prayers of thanksgiving, it helps us to open our eyes not just to see what we don't have, or what we feel like we're lacking, but it positions our heart towards expectancy to God. It reminds us what He's already done, so we know He has the power to do it again.
4. Prayer of Praise
A prayer of thanksgiving focuses on God for what He has done, but the next type is known as a prayer of praise or worship and honors God for simply who He is. This type of prayer helps us to keep our focus on God.
When we're reminded of how big our God is with prayers of praise, our challenges and shortcomings become less intimidating, and our faith and trust and God begin to grow. How do we pray a prayer of praise? Well, here's the thing that we must keep in mind. You can't praise who you don't know. Developing a relationship with God and growing in the knowledge of who He is, gives us the truth we need to prayerfully praise Him. We can see an example of a prayer of praise in Micah 7:18 that says:
“Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in steadfast love.” (Micah 7:18 ESV)
As you can see in this prayer, it's a reminder of who God is and His character. He doesn't stay angry. He has compassion; He is forgiving. These are just a short list of things that we can praise and worship God for, but His word is a great place to start to understand His character so that you too, can practice the prayer of praise.
5. Prayer of Repentance
The fifth type of prayer is a prayer of repentance or a prayer of confession. This type of prayer is asking God to forgive you of your sin.
This prayer includes confessing our sin to God, a commitment to turn from our sin, asking for forgiveness, and requesting God’s strength and power to keep us in His will not to turn back.
A prayer of repentance is not a pity party where we replay our sin over and over again to feel bad about ourselves. It’s about getting in alignment with God’s will when we’ve fallen off track.
It's truly about laying your sin at the feet of God, aligning yourself with what He believes is right, and what He believes is wrong, receiving His forgiveness, and His power to do better next time.
A great example of a prayer of repentance is Psalm 51, where King David asks God for forgiveness for adultery and murder. In verses 1 and 2, he prays:
“Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!” (Psalm 51:1-2 ESV)
King David is noted in the Bible as being a man after God's own heart (1 Samuel 13:14). You may wonder why since he was also an adulterer and murderer. The thing about David was he had a heart for God, so when he did sin against God, he would sincerely repent and turn from his sin and back to God. His humility in Psalm 51 shows that David didn’t try to justify his sin or act like it didn’t exist. He took it to God and trusted in God's forgiveness and ability to cleanse him of his sin and we should too.
6. Prayer of Agreement
The sixth type of prayer is a prayer of agreement or corporate prayer. This is simply when we pray with others. Matthew 18:20 says:
“For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” (Matthew 18:20 ESV)
Corporate prayer is really special because there is power in unity. We can experience that unity when we come together in agreement through prayer. Many of you probably participated in corporate prayer at church, maybe you have a prayer partner, or pray with your husband. Every morning on the way to school, my kids and I pray together in the car for that day.
A prayer of agreement doesn't have to be elaborate. It can just be as simple as calling up a friend and saying, can you pray with me? There's power in coming together in agreement with others as we approach the throne of God through prayer so this is another type of prayer we want to be intentional about.
7. Prayer of Listening
The seventh type of prayer is listening prayer. This type of prayer involves creating quiet to not speak, but to simply listen to God.
This is something good to do before any of the other types of prayers, because it can really open your heart up to hear what God may want to say to you. Many times, we approach prayer and we just talk and talk and talk, and then we say, “amen,” but God wants to talk to us just as much as we want to talk to Him. I would argue He wants to talk to us even more.
So it's important to set aside time just to hear from God. As you do, you might not always hear anything, but the purpose is to be still in the presence of God. His presence is enough alone to calm your mind and soul before you actually enter into any other type of prayer.
The Lord may place something on your heart in that time of stillness that will encourage your soul, or give you the wisdom that you need, or the answer you were looking for that you wouldn't have heard otherwise.
I think about the prophet Elijah and God speaking to him in 1 Kings 19, through a “gentle whisper” or “still small voice.” Many times, that's how God will speak to us, in stillness and quiet. John 10:27 says:
“My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.” (John 10: 27-28 ESV)
Jesus says His followers will know His voice. That means we are listening for His voice. Talking to God is one way that we pray, but listening is another way and both are equally important in the growth of our relationship with God.
8. Prayer of the Holy Spirit
The eighth type of prayer is prayer of the Holy Spirit. When it comes to prayer and we find ourselves at a loss for words, it's okay. In times like this, we can pray by the spirit. Romans 8:26-27 says:
“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.” (Romans 8:26-27 ESV)
I love that we don't always have to know what to pray, because prayer isn't about saying all the right things. Much of prayer is about being in God's presence as I mentioned earlier. God understands that sometimes we won't have the words and that's why He has gifted us with the Holy Spirit to intercede on our behalf to pray for us, when we can’t pray for ourselves.
I know I've personally experienced times where I've been so hurt or so overwhelmed that when it was time for me to sit down and pray, only tears came out. But you know what? God understands that too. Our prayers may not always be nice words, or neatly strung together to form proper sentences and paragraphs. Sometimes our prayer will be our cries and moans to God. It may be us praying in our prayer language as we let the Spirit lead. That's perfectly fine, because as God’s beloved filled with His Holy Spirit, He knows the deepest longings of our hearts, that our mouth sometimes can't form the words to say.
9. Prayer of Lament
The ninth type of prayer is a prayer of lament. This is crying out to God with our sorrows and grief. Psalm 88 is one of the saddest and most dismal chapters in the Bible. The writer expresses feelings of being overwhelmed, cut off, forgotten, grieved, rejected, terrified, and despaired.
Sometimes, we are ashamed of our feelings and don’t take them to God, especially when we see them as negative feelings, like sadness, depression, and hopelessness. We think that if we have faith and believe in God, we should always be happy and joyful, but this could not be further from the truth. Following Christ does not exempt us from negative feelings. In fact, Jesus told us Himself that in this world, we will have trouble (John 16:33). Don’t you think then He also expects us to feel some kind of way about that?
With God, we don't have to be fake; this is why we’re told to cast our cares and anxieties on Him (1 Peter 5:7). The Book of Lamentations is all about pain and suffering. Although we have hope in God, as humans, we will get sad, depressed, and dismayed. The blessing we have even in that, is that we don’t have to keep it bottled in like our feelings don’t exist or matter because they do and God cares.
10. Prayer of Promise
In her book “Fervent,” Priscilla Shirer gives a method for prayer using the acronym P.R.A.Y. “P” is for praise. “A” is for ask. “R” is for repent. All prayers we’ve discussed so far in this video. Finally, she shares that “Y” stands for Yes. This is where you come into agreement with God’s promises and pray them over your life. Our tenth prayer is a prayer of promise where you pray God’s Word back to Him. 2 Corinthians 1:20 says:
“For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.” (2 Corinthians 1:20 ESV)
A prayer of promise is our “yes and amen” to what we know for sure about God. A promise is a declaration that God will do something, it’s not conditional, and we can fully place our hope, trust, and faith in His promises. When we’re unsure, worried, or fearful, we can remind ourselves of God’s truth that never changes. He will always love us. (Romans 8:37-39) He will always be with us. (Matthew 28:20) He will always work things out for our good and His glory. (Romans 8:28) As we remind ourselves of His promises when we pray God’s Word back to Him, we can receive His peace, comfort, and confidence, no matter what we are facing. Not sure how to do that? I have a video called “How to Pray God’s Word” that I’ll link below.
It’s important to know more than one way to pray because this gives us a variety of ways to connect with God and unlock the power of prayer in our lives. We don’t have to feel pressed to pray only one way, but now we can pray in many ways based on what we desire, what season of life we are in, or how we most need to connect with God.
Now that you know the 10 types of prayer, you are better positioned to pray without ceasing as we are commanded to do in 1 Thessalonians 5:17. So if you desire prayer to be as naturally consistent and life-giving as breathing, I invite you to watch this video, where I share 3 ways to pray without ceasing.
For more encouragement, download my free 5-Day Prayer Guide to pray like Jesus at belovedwomen.org. Thanks for watching, and until next time, be beautiful, be blessed, and beloved. 
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