Help with references for study on prayer

I've been asked to do a study on prayer for the bible study I lead (our normal study right now is verse-by-verse through Ephesians). I've got 60 - 90 minutes to cover the topic, and I'm woefully unqualified without that constraint. Obviously I have way too many resources from Logos. I'm trying to stick with a fairly constrained set of those.

One aspect I want to cover is our communion with God and specifically how one of His motivations in creation was to have communion with us. Any thoughts on this? What I'm really looking for are verses (more than non-Bible resources) which address this.

Any assistance is appreciated. Thanks,

Donnie

P.S. I love Logos!!! Tonight I needed to use the Copy Bible Verses tool for the first time (just been doing basic right-click selection copy up to now). Amazing - able to get just the results I wanted. Now if I could just figure out how to use that for copying selections from non-Bible resources (hint, hint ...

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David P. Moore

One aspect I want to cover is our communion with God and specifically how one of His motivations in creation was to have communion with us. Any thoughts on this? What I'm really looking for are verses (more than non-Bible resources) which address this.

Hi Donnie, you may have already done this, but I searched on communion NEAR god in my topicals collection, and got several hits. Several of my topicals have a heading titled "Communion with God," that leads to various verses.

Donnie Hale

Hi Donnie, you may have already done this, but I searched on communion NEAR god in my topicals collection, and got several hits. Several of my topicals have a heading titled "Communion with God," that leads to various verses.

Thanks - I'll give that a whirl. Any specifics on what resources are in your topicals collections? I have Platinum and a number of add-ons beyond that.

Donnie

Rosie Perera

I'm not David, but here's my Topical Bible Indexes collection:

EDIT: Interesting how all over the map they are in terms of resource type.

David P. Moore

I have 10 titles in my topicals collection. I simply did title:topical and then added 4 more.

The New Topical Textbook by Torrey has an entry on communion with God, and specifically this sub entry:

Have, in prayer. Php 4:6; Heb 4:16.

The MacArthur Topical Bible and Nelson's New Topical Index also has "Communion with God" entries.

I contemplated how to tackle the " one of His motivations in creation was to have communion with us" concept, but haven't found a search approach I like yet.

Rosie Perera

I contemplated how to tackle the " one of His motivations in creation was to have communion with us" concept, but haven't found a search approach I like yet.

Try "created for communion" OR "created * for communion" -- that will pick up "created us for communion" and "created man for communion," etc. You could also try "created to have communion" OR "created * to have communion" but on my library the former phrase found nothing, and the latter with the wildcard is still churning after several minutes. You could try created BEFORE 2 words communion, but that might pick up too much. Another possibility would be creation NEAR "communion with God".

Try the same searches on Google Books (except it doesn't have the proximity operators NEAR, BEFORE, etc.). For example, there is a book by Arthur Pink, Spiritual Union and Communion, that we don't have in Logos, but is available for preview on there.

In The Fundamentals there's a chapter on "The Doctrinal Value of the First Chapters of Genesis." Here's an excerpt: "The foundation of all Hamartology and Anthropology lies in the first three chapters of Genesis. It teaches us that man was originally created for communion with God, and that whether his personality was dichotomistic or trichotomistic, he was entirely fitted for personal, intelligent fellowship with his Maker, and was united with Him in the bonds of love and knowledge."

Allen Browne

Presumably you've already done a simple search like this:

It looks like the verses cluster around 3 passages: Eph 1:16-19; 3:13-18; and 6:18-20.

The first two are examples from Paul's own life (worth imitating?), and the last identifes some of what we are to pray for.

The theme of God restoring in Christ what was lost in Adam does undergird Paul's thought in this book (e.g. 1:10), as does our adoption into the Abrahamic family (being "in Christ") as members of God's family/household (2:19) and being the temple God lives in (2:21), with the familial relationship being the climax of 3:14-19. The practical outflow means both unity with brothers and sisters (3), and living as children imitating Father (5:1) which affects all our human relationships (5-6) as well as our interactions with the worldly powers (6) which is the ultimate focus of his instruction on prayer in this book (6:18ff.)

So, restored fellowship with God, fellowship with the family, and responsibility in world God is wanting to restore, with prayer as an undergirding expression of those relationships. Does that help in the context of Eph?

Bohuslav Wojnar

I found a few interesting books on the subject of prayer in my library. Here are some examples:

Patterson, B., & Goetz, D. L. (1999). Vol. 7: Deepening your conversation with God. The pastor's soul series; Library of leadership development. Minneapolis, Minn.: Bethany House Publishers.

Bounds, E. M. (1999). The necessity of prayer. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

Bounds, E. M. (1999). Power through Prayer. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

EDITED:

Here are some more:

Jones, T. P. (2005). Praying Like the Jew, Jesus: Recovering the Ancient Roots of New Testament Prayer. Clarksville, MD: Lederer Books.

Hayford, J. W., & Bauer, R. (1997). Praying in the Spirit : Heavenly resources for praise and intercession. Spirit-Filled Life Kingdom Dynamics Study Guides. Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

Wiersbe, W. W. (1988). Prayer: Basic Training. Wheaton, IL: Tyndale.

Pink, A. W. (2005). The Lord's Prayer. Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

(and many other Pink's books)

Donnie Hale

Thanks everyone for these great suggestions! I can't wait to try some of these out tonight.

Donnie

Donnie Hale

I'm not David, but here's my Topical Bible Indexes collection:

Rosie: What's the filter you use to come up w/ that collection?

Donnie