In my early years of prayer journaling, I began with the practice of listening, and then writing. The further I have gone from that practice, the more self-centered and frustrated my prayers have become.
When I was in high school, one of the youth workers introduced me to My Partner Prayer Notebook, by Becky Tirabassi . I clung to that teaching like a lifeline of communication with the Father.
According to Tirabassi, LMNOP represented God’s Part:
Listening
Messages (notes from sermons, other books, etc.)
New Testament
Old Testament
Proverbs
Followed by My PART:
Praise
Admit
Request
Thanks
Tirabassi presented the importance of listening to God in various ways before we expressed our part of the prayer. The format was a written prayer journal—a practice I followed for more than a dozen years.
As we pray over the plans God has led us to as a ministry for 2017, especially during our 24-hour Prayer-a-thon tomorrow, I encourage you to start by listening and by some time in the Word. Feel free to review the verses we listed on each day of the Prayer Calendar.
And if you have not signed up for a specific time slot yet, please do! We love to see the points around the world from which people are praying together, as one voice, throughout the day.
There is also a Prayer Guide available with a few items updated from when we first published the Prayer Calendar.
1. Tirabassi, Becky. My Partner Prayer Notebook. Thomas Nelson, 1990.