“Do you ever sense that there’s far more to prayer, and to God’s vision for your life, than what you’re experiencing? If so, it’s time you learned from the legend of Honi the Circle Maker—a man bold enough to draw a circle in the sand and not budge from inside it until God answered his prayers for his people.”

That’s an excerpt from a book written by called THE CIRCLE MAKER: Praying Circles Around Your Biggest Dreams and Greatest Fears, (Kindle edition here, audiobook here) written by Mark Batterson – author of several bestselling books such as In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day.

I recently started listening this to book on audio and I LOVE IT!  The book is PHENOMENAL!  It totally inspired me to change the way I pray because it opened my eyes to what prayer should/could look like.  Below is a brief excerpt from the book:

“There is nothing that God loves more than keeping promises, answering prayers, performing miracles, and fulfilling dreams.  That is who He is.  That is what He does.  And the bigger the circle we draw, the better, because God gets more glory.  The greatest moments in life are the miraculous moments when human impotence and divine omnipotence intersect – and they intersect when we draw a circle around the impossible situations in our lives and invite God to intervene.”

The book is not just inspirational; it is also extremely practical and offers practical ways to begin drawing prayer circles and getting answers to your prayers.  The idea isn’t to use prayer as a bargaining tool with God or as some way to bribe God into giving you what you want.  The idea is to:

1.  Discover God’s VISION for your life.  If He went to all the trouble of creating us and putting here on earth, there must be a reason.  And the reason has to be greater than to buy a house and fill it with 2.5 kids.  God has a dream for your life and it’s time to discover what that dream is.  I assure you that it won’t be what you think it is.  It is usually something much bigger than we can imagine.

2.  Unlock God’s PROVISION through specific prayers.  “You do not have because you do not ask.” (James 4:2).  The bottleneck of answered prayers is not on the side of the Listener (God), but rather on the side of the speaker (us).  Most of the time, God is more eager to answer than we are to pray specific prayers.

3.  Unleash God’s POWER through bold prayers.  As Mark says in the book, “God honors bold prayers because bold prayers honor God.”

Prayer is something that we don’t understand.  It is something heavenly and divine that God allows us to participate in.  Through prayer, we enter into the highest heaven and have access to the throne room of God.  Most of us don’t pray well because we don’t understand what prayer is.

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.”  Matthew 7:7-8

What impossibly big dream is God calling you to draw a prayer circle around?  The time to start is now!

Discussion: Can you share any tips that have helped you to grow in terms of boldness in prayer?