Prayer Is the Mental Game

Big Point: Persistent prayer is the key to overcoming frustration in life.  Mistakes or errors occur every day in baseball, but many players don’t have the mental game that allows them to let go of errors and this hurts their chances for success.  —Mike Edger

Mike Edger, writer for Sports Psychology today, shares in his article, “Letting Go of Errors and Mistakes”: Errors such...
as missing a throw, botching a simple ground ball, striking out at the plate, or dropping a pop up occur all the time in baseball. Nobody is perfect, therefore errors are just another part of the game. However, these errors often become a huge mental barrier for athletes who cannot cope with mistakes, and as a result it affects their performance. In many cases…these athletes will become frustrated and shut down for the remainder of the game.

Hanging onto our sins can have the same effect in our life and it usually snowballs. By taking time to pray though, we can keep our focus.

Prayer is the true connection with God. Combine that with spending time in His Word and you are learning how to communicate and connect with God. We have to talk with Him. At first, this can seem intimidating but with practice, it gets easier. A simple, easy to remember prayer model and acronym to use is ACTS: for adoration, confession, thanks and stuff. Myers shares that a friend started by spending two minutes on each prayer area and, at first, two minutes seemed REALLY long. But after awhile, it wasn’t enough time to even scratch the surface.

When we pray and give all of our mistakes to God, accepting His grace and forgiveness in return, we can move on and live a better life. The key is to keep your focus on Him. What an amazing feeling to know that you can say anything at all and you will be understood, empathized with and forgiven.

READ and THINK….What does the Bible say?

1. In this verse, the apostle Peter is telling us that we can trust God with all of our worries, concerns and cares.

Question: Who are we to give our worries to? Why?

1 Peter 5:7 (New Living Translation)Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.

Answer:

2. In Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, he is talking about daily life and the way to live it with Christ at the center. The point is not that men should do nothing but pray, but that nothing else we do should hinder prayer.

Question: When should we pray? When should we stop?

1 Thessalonians 5:17 (New Living Translation)Never stop praying.

Answer:

3. Here, Paul is telling us that no matter what our circumstances might be, God will give us peace if we invite Him into the situation.

Question: What will happen if you present your problems to God? 

Philippians 4:6-7 (New International Version)⁶ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷ And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Answer:

LIVE … What will you do now?Based on the verse from 1 Peter, what approach should you take with your worries?

In what way can the ACTS acronym be either a starting place for prayer or a way to deepen your current prayer life?

What situation in your life do you need to invite God into today? How can you do that with thankfulness and gratitude?

How would your frustration and stress level change if you completely trusted and took the advice in these verses?

PRAY … God, what do you want me to know and do?Spend two minutes in one of the areas of ACTS (adoration, confession, thanks or stuff.) Set a timer if you need to. If prayer is already a regular part of your life, spend time in an area where you typically don’t spend as much time.