The term tweeting, as it is used in the social media world, can be quite trivial in nature, but I want to re-define the term in a positive way as we apply it to prayer.

Tweet Prayers are short prayers that focus on one person, one need or one concept, based on Scripture and the leading of the Holy Spirit.

One can find validation for this type of prayer in the Bible. When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray, He gave them The Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) as a model to follow. This prayer in its entirety is very short, but one could even consider The Lord’s Prayer a collection of several short Tweet Prayers: (1) Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. (2) Give us this day our daily bread. (3) Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us. (4) Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Each of these individual concepts within the Lord’s Prayer might be prayed on its own.

My prayer life took on a whole new dimension when I began to pray using Tweet Prayers. As I mentioned earlier, my college-age daughter spent a semester abroad as an exchange student and I quickly discovered there is nothing like a mother’s worry to add a new dimension to one’s prayer life. Because she was traveling on weekends and school breaks and I couldn’t communicate with her as often as I would have liked, constant worry for her safety plagued me.

One morning while I was praying for her, I felt overwhelmed with fear. I began to read Psalm 5 and one phrase seemed to leap off the page—spread your protection over her (v.11). I immediately asked God to spread His protection over her wherever she was. That prayer comforted me and arrested my fears as nothing else had done. I wrote that verse in my prayer notebook under her name and it has become one of my on-going Tweet Prayers for her.

As I pray for those people whom I believe God has given me a responsibility to pray for, I ask Him to give me the specific prayers for their individual needs. Sometimes it’s a particular scripture verse. Other times it may be a sentence or a single word or picture that sticks in my mind. I write down whatever I sense I am to pray beside that person’s name and I pray that same prayer over the next days, weeks or months as I am led.

(Excerpted from LORD, IT’S BORING IN MY PRAYER CLOSET (How to Revitalize Your Prayer Life)  ©2014