{"id":40709,"date":"2026-06-22T22:00:43","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T05:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/?p=40709"},"modified":"2026-06-22T12:20:44","modified_gmt":"2026-06-22T19:20:44","slug":"26-0623","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/26-0623\/","title":{"rendered":"Closet Prayers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: right;\">by Max Lucado<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-40711 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/260623_1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/260623_1.jpg 600w, https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/260623_1-300x150.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Religious leaders loved to make theater out of their prayers. The show nauseated Jesus. In Matthew 6:6 he said, \u201cWhen you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father who cannot be seen. Your Father can see what is done in secret, and he will reward you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The words surely stunned Jesus\u2019 audience. The people were simple farmers and stonemasons.\u00a0 They couldn\u2019t enter the temple, but they could enter their closets. The point? He\u2019s low on fancy, high on accessibility. You needn\u2019t woo him with location or wow him with eloquence. It\u2019s the power of a\u00a0<em>simple<\/em>\u00a0prayer.<\/p>\n<p>Join me every day for four weeks to pray four minutes. A simple prayer. Then get ready to connect with God like never before.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-40565\" src=\"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1-unnamed-7.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"188\" height=\"300\" \/>\u00a0 \u00a0Read more\u00a0<a title=\"Before Amen: The Power of a Simple Prayer\" href=\"https:\/\/maxlucado.us2.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u=bed511e434184985961d50fcb&amp;id=c9668dc127&amp;e=0716428f80\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" data-saferedirecturl=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?q=https:\/\/maxlucado.us2.list-manage.com\/track\/click?u%3Dbed511e434184985961d50fcb%26id%3Dc9668dc127%26e%3D0716428f80&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1780708342826000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3_JhZBG08V_1_JUTXCvTKQ\"><em>Before Amen: The Power of a Simple Prayer<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Religious leaders loved to make theater out of their prayers. The show nauseated Jesus. In Matthew 6:6 he said, \u201cWhen you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father who cannot be seen. Your Father can see what is done in secret, and he will reward you.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The words surely stunned Jesus\u2019 audience. The people were simple farmers and stonemasons.  They couldn\u2019t enter the temple, but they could enter their closets. The point? He\u2019s low on fancy, high on accessibility. You needn\u2019t woo him with location or wow him with eloquence. It\u2019s the power of a simple prayer.<\/p>\n<p>Join me every day for four weeks to pray four minutes. A simple prayer. Then get ready to connect with God like never before.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40711,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[148],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-upwords"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40709"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40709\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40712,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40709\/revisions\/40712"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}