The Savior's Example

Perhaps the most instructive counsel on prayer occurred as the resurrected Savior visited the Nephites. As He ministered to the people, He prayed after almost everything He did. He healed the sick, and then He knelt and prayed (see 3 Nephi 17:15). After the multitude was baptized, the Savior "departed out of the midst of them … and bowed himself to the earth" and prayed (3 Nephi 19:19). He taught the people to pray, and then He "turned from them again, and went a little way off and bowed himself to the earth; and he prayed" (3 Nephi 19:27).

If the Savior of the world felt the need for constant prayer, how much greater is our need? The Savior clearly understood, as did President Kimball many years ago in Finland, that prayer is essential to our earthly existence.

Nearly four decades have passed since I met President Kimball in Finland, but his simple, powerful instruction remains etched in my memory:

I need thee, oh, I need thee; Every hour I need thee! Oh, bless me now, my Savior; I come to thee!

Prayer is more than a quick morning and evening ritual, more than an acknowledgment for a few seconds each day that God is there, and more than a cry for help.

Our prayers, when combined with fasting and pondering the scriptures, constitute the revelatory process.

Illustration by Paul Mann; photography by Ash Ram

Notes

1.

Hymns, no. 98.

2.

See The Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball, ed. Edward L. Kimball (1982), 135.

3.

Bruce R. McConkie, "Why the Lord Ordained Prayer," Ensign, Jan. 1976, 9.

4.

Bible Dictionary, "Prayer."

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