A.W. Tozer - Going Higher with God in Prayer: Cultivating a Lifelong Dialogue

You cannot understand A.W. Tozer without understanding his prayer life. Everything he did flowed out of his time in prayer.

One of the many profound things Tozer says about prayer is that we need to pray our walk and walk our prayer. Sadly, I often find that my own prayer life and walk are completely different. In our prayer, we should begin to bring our life and ministry together and focus on God.

This book is not a textbook on how to pray. There are many of those out there, and Tozer was not interested in that. This is also not a book that outlines an easy method on how we should pray or what the attitude of our prayers should be. No, this book is a direct challenge for you to get on your knees and learn how to pray.

Tozer, throughout his life, got rid of anything that compromised his prayer ministry. His praying was not just a duty he performed to please God, and it was not a ritual he went through to ease his conscience, but it was a ministry. For Tozer, it was his great pleasure to ascend into the mind of God in fellowship.

As I edited this book, I saw that God wants to use me and work through me, and my prayer is the channel through which God can do that. It is like Jacobs ladder: The ladder ascends and it also descends. That means we can go up into the presence of God, and that God can come down into our situation. It is our prayer life that brings the two together.

The most important quote in this book comes from Miguel de Molinos (16281696), who said, Prayer is an ascent or elevation of the mind to God. That is how Tozer viewed his prayer life.

Some things you read here will at first disturb you. That reaction never bothered Dr. Tozer. If you like everything in this book, Dr. Tozer would probably think you have not read it. What he lays out is not compatible with popular culture, or even todays Church culture. Unfortunately, many in the Church today are trying to align their prayer lives with the world around us.

Tozer makes it very clear that God does not hear every prayer. This needs to be grasped by people today, particularly in the Church. The unsaved person has no avenue to God. It is only through Jesus Christ that anybody has access to God. Just because you pray does not mean you have Gods ear.

As a Christian, I need to concentrate on discovering Gods will on a daily basis and then bring my life into alignment with that will. God makes it very clear that if our prayer is based upon reason or knowledge, it will get us nowhere. God will not be able to work through that prayer.

This material comes from an excellent collection of sermons in which Tozer points out that the greatest curse for the Church today is unanswered prayer. What bothered him most was that most Christians are not bothered by that. Not knowing how to pray is one of the most significant obstacles in our Christian lives, and this book works to overcome that obstacle.

There are many blessings that come with prayer, but also perfect submission. Our prayer lives are a true reflection of our understanding of who we are in Christ, and if Jesus prayed to His Father, Not as I will, but as You will (Matthew 26:39), so must we.

This book will help cultivate a desperately needed prayer life, or dialogue with God, in todays Christian. Tozers challenge to us is this: Are our prayers more powerful and effective today than they were a year ago?

Included is a chapter from the biography of Tozer, A Man of Prayer , demonstrating how prayer was the lifeline in all of his ministry and life.

Dr. James L. Snyder