Pathway to Victory

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Hey podcast listeners. Thanks for streaming today's podcast from Pathway to Victory and Dr. Robert Jeffress.

We're dedicated to bringing you bold biblical teaching that transforms your life and strengthens your walk with God.

And you can study God's word alongside Dr. Jeffress in person on the 2026 Pathway to Victory Cruise to Alaska.

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Have you ever witnessed the breathtaking majesty.

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Of massive glaciers rising from crystal blue waters or stood in awe as bald.

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Eagles soar over snow capped mountain? I want you to experience these unforgettable moments with me on the Pathway to Victory Cruise to Alaska, June 13th through 20th, 2026.

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Join Dr. Jeffress and the Pathway to Victory family for a spectacular seven-day adventure aboard Holland America's luxurious Koningsdam.

Indulge in elegant staterooms, world-class dining, and expansive decks perfect for breathtaking views.

Visit historic ports like Juneau, Skagway, and Ketchikan, where wilderness and frontier history await.

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There's something powerful about connecting with God and fellow believers in the majesty of his untamed wilderness. I truly believe this journey will refresh.

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You spiritually, physically and emotionally.

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Cabins are filling quickly, so reserve yours today. To book your spot on the 2026 Pathway to Victory cruise to Alaska, call 888-280-6747 or go to ptv.org now. Here's today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.

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Hi, this is Robert Jeffress and I'm glad to study God's Word with you.

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Every day on this Bible teaching program.

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On today's edition of Pathway to Victory.

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We'Ve talked about Jesus example of prayer. We've talked about why we should pray in these final moments that we have together. I want to talk about some practical ways four ways you can develop to transform your heart into a praise welcome.

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To Pathway to Victory with author and pastor Dr. Robert Jeffress. Just as your physical heart is comprised of various chambers, so is your spiritual heart.

And one of the primary components of true spiritual transformation is prayer. Today on Pathway to Victory, Dr. Robert Jeffress explains why prayer is absolutely essential to the health of a transformed heart.

But first, let's take a minute to hear some important ministry updates.

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Thanks, David, and welcome again to Pathway to Victory. Have you noticed that whenever a personal crisis occurs, we tend to spend more time alerting all our friends and family than we do in prayer? Sure, telling our family is a natural reaction, but sometimes our initial response to send a text or call a friend actually does little or nothing to solve our problem. How much better to exercise our prayer muscles so that talking to God becomes our first response.

Well, learning to pray is one of the seven marks of a disciple, and it's our topic today. It's also one of the issues that's addressed in a very practical book called *Encouragement for the Heart of a Disciple*. In this gorgeous full-color padded hardcover book, you'll learn how to exercise the disciplines of prayer, forgiveness, and contentment. Plus, *Encouragement for the Heart of a Disciple* contains 80 breathtaking photos from God's creation. The book is designed to infuse you with hope and joy as you cultivate the seven marks of a true disciple.

We'll also include a collection of six pocket-sized prayer cards so that you can easily engage in conversation with Jesus throughout your day. Both the book and the prayer cards are an expression of our thanks when you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory. We'll give more details later, so be ready to write down our contact information.

But right now, let's open our Bibles to the Book of Matthew, chapter six. This next message in our series is titled *Developing a Praying Heart*.

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I imagine if we had a survey today and you were honest about your prayer life, you could probably identify with me in saying you feel guilty at times about your lack of prayer. And yet all of my questions about the value of prayer melt away when I look at the example of Jesus Christ. You know, we're in a series called the Seven Marks of a Disciple and we've said that the essence of discipleship is a changed life that comes from a transformed heart. If we're gonna have an overall healthy transformed heart, there are six chambers in our spiritual heart that have to be functioning properly to produce that transformed heart and the changed life we all want.

Today we're going to look at the second mark of a disciple, which is the first of those six chambers. I call it a praying heart. A praying heart. You know, Jesus showed us the reason we ought to pray both by his own life's example and by his teaching. Well, you say, why should we pray? Scripture gives us four reasons that prayer ought to be a regular part of our life.

First of all, the Bible teaches that prayer develops our intimacy with God. It develops our intimacy with God. Have you discovered intimacy cannot be mandated with another person, even with your own mate? Just because you go through a wedding ceremony, you have a marriage certificate, you make certain vows and exchange rings, that doesn't mean you are instantly intimate with one another. Intimacy takes work. The same thing is true in our relationship with God. Sometimes I talk to people and they'll say, you know, I just feel so distant from God. And I gently ask, well, when's the last time you talked to him? Oh, I don't have time to do that. And when you move away from God and you don't talk to him, there's gonna be that barrier, that lack of intimacy.

A second reason for praying is prayer unleashes the power of God. And the Bible teaches that many times that is a proper motivation for praying. We want God to do something. We want God to do something that he's not going to do unless we ask. Remember James 4:2. You have not.

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Why?

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Because you ask not. There is a connection between our asking and God answering. A third reason we pray is prayer protects us with the peace of God. Have you ever had a medical test before, perhaps a biopsy? And the doctor said, now, we'll give you the results in 48 hours or 72 hours. As you wait for those test results, a thousand what-ifs come to your mind. What if it turns out this way? What if it leads to this? What would I do? What would I do? What would I do? When you pray and talk to God instead of worrying, the peace of God will guard your minds against worry and those what-ifs.

Fourthly, why do we pray? Because prayer aligns our will with God's will. Prayer is the primary means by which God transforms our heart, specifically our will. You know, the greatest battle you and I face in our life is this: Is it gonna be God's will or my will that gets done on Earth? You see, prayer is not about getting my will done in heaven. It's about getting God's will done on Earth and specifically in my life. And that's a battle. It's a battle to get to that place where we say, I'd rather go God's way than my way.

Unless you think you're the only one who struggles with that, even Jesus, the perfect son of God, struggled with that. When in Luke 22:42, he poured out his heart, saying, "Father, if thou art willing, allow this experience to pass from me." At that moment, Jesus' will was clear: He didn't want to go to the cross, not just for the physical horror, but the spiritual horror of bearing the sins of the world and being alienated from his Father. That's why he said, "Lord, if there is any other way, take this experience from me." But then, quickly after one comma, he adds, "Yet not my will, but your will be done."

We've talked about Jesus' example of prayer. We've talked about why we should pray. In these final moments that we have together, I want to talk about some practical ways—four ways you can develop to transform your heart into a praying heart so you can experience that changed life you want to experience. Would you jot these down? These are very simple principles, but they really could revolutionize your prayer life.

Principle number one: Don't complicate prayer. You know, we get this idea that if we could just come up with the right words, the right vocabulary, and use those words in the right sequence, that somehow it's kind of abracadabra. We're gonna make God do something he wouldn't otherwise do. Jesus said, forget all of that. In Matthew 6:7, he said, "When you are praying, don't use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words." Verse 8 continues, "Don't be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him."

I remember once performing one of the saddest funeral services I ever conducted. A young mother had died as a result of cancer, leaving behind not only her husband but her two small daughters. Now, I'll never forget at the end of the service, walking out with those two little girls and standing there as they watched their mother's casket being loaded into the hearse. One of those little girls, six years old, had tears streaming down her face. And once the casket was loaded and the door was shut, she turned to me and said, "Pastor, do you think this coming Sunday in church we could sing the song 'Healing Rain'? Do you think we could sing that song?"

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It really helps me.

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How did I respond to her request? Did I say, oh, honey, I would love to, but you didn't use the right words. You should have said, Dr. Jeffress, can we sing this song? Sorry, I can't answer that request. You didn't use the right words, or did I say to her, well, ask me 10 times and I'll think about it. Come back for the next 10 days and ask me, and then we'll think about it. Did I respond that way? Of course not. Immediately, I said, well, of course we can. I had the power to answer her request. All I had to do was call the minister of music on my cell phone and it was done. I had the desire to help her. She was in need. And I had a request to bring healing to her own hurting heart. Why wouldn't I answer that request?

And that's the attitude we ought to have when we come to our heavenly Father. He's not this distant deity that we have to coax into doing something he doesn't want to do. He loves us. Jesus said, you know what, Father? Among you, having a son who asks for bread will give him a snake instead. We don't do that. And if you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father do for you? And that's why when we pray, we ought to keep it simple. To tell God not what we think should be in our heart, but what is actually in our heart.

It doesn't mean that God always answers the way we ask him to, or at the time we think he should. But if God delays his answer, or if even God says no, it's not because he hates us or doesn't care about us; it's because he loves us. Keep your prayers simple.

Number two, use a pen and pad to enhance your prayer life. You know, I'll admit to you, I have difficulty concentrating when I pray. You know, I'm a poster child for ADD, somebody said, and it's hard for me to concentrate when I pray. But I have found that using a pen and pad while praying is really helpful. Now, what do I mean by that? I mean, sometimes writing out your prayer is a way to stay focused in your prayers.

You know, we come from a religious tradition, our denomination, evangelicalism, especially Southern Baptists. We have about as much respect for written prayers as we do snake handling. I mean, it just doesn't go with what we do. We think, you know, people shouldn't write out their prayers. You know, we used to, in our church, have laymen come up and offer prayers during a service. And, you know, every now and then, there'd be a poor deacon, he'd be so terrified about praying that he would write out his prayers and tuck it in his pocket. Once every head was bowed and every eye was closed, when nobody was looking, he'd pull out the piece of paper and read his prayer.

There were always some in the church who felt like their duty was to keep their eyes open so they could see what was going on. They would watch this deacon read his prayer, and they would say, can you believe that he read his prayer? If he can't do any better than that, then why should he even bother to pray if he has to read a prayer? Well, think about it. Some of the most effective prayers in the Bible were written prayers. I mean, the Psalms are full of prayers that David wrote out.

I found myself, I don't use a pad and pen so much any longer, but sometimes I type out my prayers on my computer so I can really focus on what it is I want to say to God. Be accurate in what I want to say, you know, otherwise we fall into these banalities of prayer. Lead, guide, and direct. How many times have you heard that? Lead, guide. What is the difference between lead, guide, and direct? It's just something we fall into, or bless this, bless this, bless that. What does that mean? Bless this, bless this. Sometimes writing out your prayers is a great way to concentrate your prayers.

And even if you don't feel comfortable doing that, at least keep a list of things that you're praying for. I've told you before, I keep a prayer journal in which I record the things that I'm praying for. It allows me, when I'm praying, to actually keep my eyes open and go down that list of the things I want to talk to God about. You know, if you're going to see the President of the United States and you're not going to have a lot of time to talk to him, you better have in your mind the things you want to say. Well, God's got all the time in the world, but we don't have all the attention in the world. We ought to make a list of the things that we want to talk to God about.

And you know what keeping a list does for you? It also not only allows you to focus, but it also allows you to record God's answers to those prayers. Some of the most encouraging moments in my life have come when I've looked back and seen not only what I've asked God for, but how he has answered those requests. By the way, yes, I know we're supposed to do more than ask God for things. We're to praise God, we're to ask for his forgiveness. But you know, I've done a study on prayer. I've not found one prayer recorded in the Bible that wasn't a request for something. Yes, there's praise to God, there's an ask for forgiveness. But at the heart of every prayer in the Bible is asking God to do something. So use that pen and pad to focus your prayers.

Number three: Begin and end your day in prayer. If you're new to this praying thing or it's really not a part of your life, begin and end every day in prayer. I used to have a cigar-chomping, very irreverent accordion teacher named Al Trick. He taught me the accordion for 15 years, if you can imagine such a thing. He came out of vaudeville and he was a master at performance. I'll never forget a piece of advice he gave me when I was 6 years old about performing before an audience. He said, Robert, remember this: As long as you get the first note right and the last note right, everything in between is just fluff.

I thought, you know, there's an application there for life. How you begin a day and how you end a day really determines the success or failure of that day. Everything else is kind of fluff in between. If you want to have a successful day, begin the day. Your first note in the morning is one of prayer. David understood that in Psalm 5:3-4. He said, in the morning, O Lord, thou wilt hear my voice; in the morning, I will order my prayer to thee and eagerly watch. There's no record that David spent hours in the morning praying, but he began his day in prayer.

C.S. Lewis once observed, the moment you wake up each morning, all of your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. The first job of each morning consists of shoving them all back and listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other, larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in before your feet hit the floor. Get out of bed and hit the floor. Take a moment to talk to God, to ask him to bless your day, to pray for your family, for your church, to ask for wisdom in the decisions you're confronting that day. Begin the day in prayer.

Secondly, end the day in prayer as well. Make prayer the final thing you do before you drift off to sleep. You know, David contrasted how the ungodly in their days with how the godly in their days. In Psalm 36:4, it says that the ungodly person plans wickedness upon his bed. You know what that means? It means for an ungodly person, his last thought before he drifts off to sleep is, how can I be more wicked tomorrow than I was today? He's constantly thinking of wicked things he can do.

That's how the wicked in their day contrast that to King David, Psalm 4:4-5. Tremble and do not stumble. Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still. From there, offer the sacrifices of righteousness and trust in the Lord. Now, without being too graphic here, let me remind you that David's bed was the place of his greatest failure in life, his sin with Bathsheba that occurred in his bed. But David transformed his bed from an altar of sin to an altar of righteousness. It was from his bed that arose his prayers to God.

And that's why he says in verse 5, don't sin on your bed. Meditate in your heart upon your bed. Offer the sacrifices of righteousness. I think it's a great word for all of us. Our last thought before we drift off to sleep ought to be a prayer to God. God, thank you for the day you gave me. Lord, I acknowledge that I failed here. I'm sorry for this. I messed up here. Forgive me. Keep me and my family safe throughout the night. Awaken me in the morning and give me the desire and the ability to do your will. Our last thing we think about at night ought to be a prayer to God.

Fourthly, how do you enhance your prayer life? Redeem those random moments in your life. Redeem those random moments with prayer. I don't know if your life is like mine; I imagine it is. It seems like you're constantly going from one thing to another thing, one meeting to another meeting, one assignment to another assignment. But there's always that in-between time when you're driving, when you're waiting in line at the supermarket or at the post office. We take those in-between times and many times we just fritter them away. We think, well, this isn't important time. What's important is that next big thing I'm doing.

And yet we can use that in-between time. Redeem it and use it for good, specifically for prayer. Turn that into a habit. You know, Friday morning, I was in D.C., got up early, went over to Starbucks to get some coffee, and I was walking back from the Starbucks to the hotel.

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It was early in the morning.

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I was walking down Pennsylvania Avenue and I started reminiscing. I started thinking about, you know, times I'd been there before and the people I'd talked to. And this. I was taking a little stroll down memory lane in my mind. I thought to myself, why am I doing this? I've got five minutes. I could be talking to God. And so I turned that five-minute walk into a time to talk to God. Praying for my family, praying for you, all the church, praying for God's will to be done in my life. I was able to take five minutes and redeem that random time. If we do that, that's the way we develop a healthy prayer life.

Thomas Kelly once said, there is a way of ordering your mental life on more than one level at once. On one level, we may be thinking, discussing, seeking, calculating, meeting all the demands of external affairs. But deep within, behind the scenes, at a more profound level, we may also be in prayer, adoration, song and worship, and a gentle receptivity to divine breathings. And therein is the secret to develop what I'm calling this praying heart.

And here's the secret. The more we pray, the more we want to pray. The more we develop that prayer muscle and pray, the more we find ourselves praying. You know, I read about a famous Hollywood actress who was walking down the red carpet to a gala event and she fainted, collapsed right there. All the press got around her, other people, and she quickly came to. Somebody said, what happened? She laughed and she said, I forgot to breathe. Forgot to breathe? How stupid is that? No more stupid than forgetting to pray.

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Just as we require air in our lungs to live, we desperately need prayer in our hearts to grow. And hopefully, you found these biblical principles helpful in learning to cultivate a praying heart. To help you grow in your walk with God, we've created a brand new devotional book just for you called *Encouragement for the Heart of a Disciple*.

If you feel like you've fallen into a never-ending cycle of forgetting to pray, this book will inspire you and help you to break the habit again. It's called *Encouragement for the Heart of a Disciple*, and we're prepared to send you a copy when you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory.

This devotional book isn't a theological treatise on discipleship. This padded hardcover book is intentionally written to inspire your daily prayer life, emphasizing the relief that comes when you invite God's spirit to cultivate spiritual virtues in your life, such as contentment, forgiveness, and trust. Each chapter includes a stunning photograph from nature, complemented by a brief reflection, a Bible verse, and a short prayer to follow when you respond.

Today, we'll also include a collection of pocket-sized prayer cards so that you can easily engage in conversation with Jesus throughout your day. To be clear, both the devotional book *Encouragement for the Heart of a Disciple* and the prayer cards come with our profound thanks when you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory.

Here's David with all the details.

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You're invited to request a copy of *Encouragement for the Heart of a Disciple* by Dr. Robert Jeffress. When you give a generous gift to support the ministry of Pathway to Victory, just call 866-999-2965 or, even easier, go to ptv.org. When your ministry gift is $100 or more, we'll send you the Encouragement Resource set containing the new devotional, six clutter-free prayer cards, the *Clutter-Free Christianity* book and life application guide, and the *Seven Marks of a Disciple* message series on DVD, video, and MP3 format audio disc set.

If you'd prefer to send a check by mail, write to P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, Texas 75222. Again, that's P.O. Box 223609, Dallas, TX 75222.

I'm David J. Mullins. Christians like to hear pastors talk about love and forgiveness, but the moment you start talking about obedience, well, some people get defensive. Learn why obedience is one of the essential marks of a disciple. That's next time on Pathway to Victory.

Pathway to Victory with Dr. Robert Jeffress comes from the pulpit of the First Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas. Experience the breathtaking majesty of America's last frontier on the 2026 Pathway to Victory cruise to Alaska.

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Board Holland America's luxurious Koningsdam ship with.

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Amy and me for a journey that will refresh your soul and renew your spirit.

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Experience the unforgettable adventure June 13th through 20th, 2026. To book your cabin, call 888-280-6747 or go to PT.

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To become a Pathway partner, go to ptv.org donate or follow the link in our show notes. We hope you've been blessed by today's podcast from Pathway to Victory.