I asked ChatGPT to compare early church prayers with how we pray in evangelical churches today. Here’s the response, unedited….

1. Scriptural Emphasis
   • Prayers in Acts and the Epistles often incorporated direct references to Old Testament scriptures and prophecies, emphasizing the continuity between the Old and New Covenants.
   • Modern-day evangelical prayers might reference the Bible as well, but they are more likely to focus on New Testament passages or general biblical principles.
2. Christological Focus
   • Early Church prayers centered heavily on the person and work of Jesus Christ. They acknowledged Jesus as the risen Lord, Savior, and Mediator between God and humanity.
   • While modern evangelicals also pray in Jesus’ name, their prayers might place a greater emphasis on personal needs and life challenges.
3. Expectation of Christ’s Return
   • In the early Church, there was a strong sense of anticipation for the second coming of Christ. Prayers often reflected this longing for His return and the establishment of God’s kingdom on earth.
   • While modern evangelicals also believe in Christ’s return, their prayers might not consistently emphasize this aspect.
4. Empowerment of the Holy Spirit
   • Early Church prayers sought the filling and empowering of the Holy Spirit for boldness, wisdom, and spiritual gifts.
   • While modern evangelicals also acknowledge the Holy Spirit’s role, early Church prayers seemed to emphasize the Spirit’s direct involvement in their daily lives and ministries.
5. Community and Unity
   • Prayers in Acts and the Epistles often focused on the unity of believers, the growth of the Church, and its mission to reach the world with the Gospel.
   • Modern evangelical prayers might emphasize personal needs and individual relationships with God more prominently.
6. Persecution and Endurance
   • Early Church prayers often included requests for strength to endure persecution and opposition.
   • Since modern-day evangelicals generally do not face the same level of persecution, their prayers might focus more on personal growth and spiritual blessings.
7. Specific Apostolic Requests
   • In some instances, the Apostles prayed for specific signs, miracles, and revelations to confirm their ministry.
   • Modern-day evangelical prayers may not regularly include such specific requests for miraculous confirmations.
8. Elderly Prayers
   • There are a few instances in the New Testament where elderly saints, such as Simeon and Anna, offered prayers and prophetic utterances.
   • While modern-day evangelical churches do have elderly members, they might not be as prominent in leading public prayers.

It seems to me the encouragement would be to shift our prayers from/to:

1. Manmade principles → Bible
2. Personal needs → Jesus
3. Our concerns → God’s kingdom
4. Our efforts → Holy Spirit
5. Personal needs/relationships → unity in our mission
6. Personal growth/blessings → strength to endure
7. Independence → signs and miracles
8. (not sure what to do with the last one)

It looks like we’ve moved away from God-centered prayers (his scriptures, his Son, his kingdom, his Spirit, his mission, his strength, his power) to man-centered prayers (our principles, our needs, our concerns, our efforts,…).

What follows are some New Testament prayers. Let’s put aside our self-centered thinking and pray like they did.

Acts 4

²³ On their release, Peter and John went back to their own people and reported all that the chief priests and the elders had said to them. ²⁴ When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God. “Sovereign Lord,” they said, “you made the heavens and the earth and the sea, and everything in them. ²⁵ You spoke by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of your servant, our father David:

“‘Why do the nations rage
    and the peoples plot in vain?
²⁶ The kings of the earth rise up
    and the rulers band together
against the Lord
    and against his anointed one.

²⁷ Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. ²⁸ They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen. ²⁹ Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness. ³⁰ Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”

³¹ After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.

Ephesians 1

¹⁵ For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, ¹⁶ I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. ¹⁷ I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. ¹⁸ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, ¹⁹ and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength ²⁰ he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, ²¹ far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. ²² And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, ²³ which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

Colossians 1

³ We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, ⁴ because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all God’s people— ⁵ the faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard in the true message of the gospel ⁶ that has come to you. In the same way, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the whole world—just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and truly understood God’s grace. ⁷ You learned it from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant,^[c] who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, ⁸ and who also told us of your love in the Spirit.

⁹ For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives,^[a]10 so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, ¹¹ being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, ¹² and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. ¹³ For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, ¹⁴ in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Philippians 1

⁹ And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, ¹⁰ so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, ¹¹ filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.

2 Corinthians 12

Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. ⁸ Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. ⁹ But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. ¹⁰ That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

1 Thessalonians 3

¹¹ Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus clear the way for us to come to you. ¹² May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. ¹³ May he strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father when our Lord Jesus comes with all his holy ones.

Romans 15

⁵ May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had, ⁶ so that with one mind and one voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Ephesians 3

¹⁴ For this reason I kneel before the Father, ¹⁵ from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. ¹⁶ I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷ so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸ may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

²⁰ Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, ²¹ to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

2 Thessalonians 3

¹ As for other matters, brothers and sisters, pray for us that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored, just as it was with you. ² And pray that we may be delivered from wicked and evil people, for not everyone has faith.