“Be still and know that I am God.” These ancient words from Psalm 46:10 capture the heart of How to Pray by Pete Greig. In a world of noise and constant motion, Greig invites readers to cultivate stillness, not as a passive escape, but as a posture of presence before a God who is always present to us. Greig paints a big and contagious vision of prayer, one rooted not in formulas but in relationship. Early in the book, Greig quotes Abraham Heschel, who famously said, “Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living” (Greig 2019, 4). Prayer is what keeps us sustained in the uneasy rollercoaster of life that longs to disturb us from our stillness and our awareness of God.
Rather than offering a rigid method, Greig confesses, “After decades of night-and-day prayer, I have come to believe that 99 percent of it is just showing up: making the effort to become consciously present to the God who is constantly present to us” (Greig 2019, 10). At its core, prayer should be guided by the simple mantra: “Keep it simple, keep it real, keep it up” (Greig 2019, 15). Drawing from his own life, Greig shares a reproducible daily rhythm of prayer:
- Morning – Quiet Time: “Almost every morning, I start my day with a little time of Bible reading and prayer.”
- Midday – Lord’s Prayer: “At noon each day, an alarm on my phone reminds me to pause and pray the Lord’s Prayer.”
- Night – Examen: “Before heading to bed, I often sit quietly or take the dogs out for a short walk in order to process the day using my own version of an old Ignatian prayer tool called the Examen” (Greig 2019, 27).
The most important posture, he writes, is presence: “If we are to host the presence of the one who says, ‘Be still, and know that I am God,’ we must ourselves become more present” (Greig 2019, 35).
Published in 2019 by NavPress, How to Pray: A Simple Guide for Normal People by Pete Greig aims to help readers cultivate stillness, embrace surrender and silence before God, and develop practical frameworks for a deeper life of prayer.
A Simple Guide
Known for his leadership in the 24-7 Prayer Movement, Greig offers a practical and accessible guide for everyday people who want to grow in prayer. At 244 pages, the book is divided into thematic sections, features a foreword, an introduction, and additional appendices and resources at the end. Its simplicity and structure make it ideal for both individual use and group settings. The size 12 font makes it an easy read, and Pete’s mix of story, scripture, and church history gives readers an engaging read they will not want to put down.
The Why Behind How to Pray
This book is a practical guide designed to help ordinary people develop a life-giving rhythm of prayer. Greig’s thesis is that prayer is not just for the spiritually elite but is accessible to all who wish to encounter God. He presents prayer as a relational, not transactional, discipline and uses the acronym P.R.A.Y. (Pause, Rejoice, Ask, Yield) to structure the book. Greig writes with a pastoral tone, blending personal stories, biblical insight, and gentle humor to make the subject approachable. His style is engaging, down-to-earth, and deeply encouraging. Following the rhythms of the Lord’s Prayer, Greig gives us a framework of prayer as an act of reorientation, which shows us that “the best way to start praying, therefore, is actually to stop praying. To pause. To be still. To put down your prayer list and surrender your own personal agenda. To stop talking at God long enough to focus on the wonder of who he actually is. To “be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him” (Greig 2019, 35-36)
A Look Inside: How to Pray by Pete Greig
I find that How to Pray truly lives up to its subtitle as a simple guide for normal people. The book begins with a foreword, reading guide, and introduction, then moves into five major sections. Part 1 lays the foundation by addressing why we pray and how to begin praying meaningfully.
Each subsequent section unpacks one element of this acronym. “Pause” focuses on stillness, surrender, and centering before God. “Rejoice” explores adoration and worship. “Ask” includes three chapters on petition, intercession, and a brief but thoughtful treatment of unanswered prayer. While it doesn’t dive as deeply into unanswered prayer as Greig’s other book God on Mute, it provides a meaningful starting point. Finally, the “Yield” section—by far the longest—covers contemplative prayer, listening, confession, spiritual warfare, and obedience.
Greig ends with a few appendices and curated resources, making the book highly usable for both study and ongoing reference.
About Pete Greig
Pete Greig is the founder of the 24-7 Prayer Movement, which has inspired a global network of people committed to intercession, spiritual formation, and mission. He currently serves as the Senior Pastor of Emmaus Road Church in Guildford, England. A prolific author, his other books include God on Mute, Dirty Glory, and How to Hear God. In How to Pray, Greig writes from decades of experience praying, researching, and teaching on prayer, into a published format that is accessible, inviting, and practical for those beginning or rekindling a life of prayer.
Why I Read This Book
As a Doctor of Ministry student at Kairos University, my research explores the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9–13) as both a theological and practical framework for spiritual formation and communal discipleship. My doctoral project, The Way of Life: The Lord’s Prayer as a Path and Framework, integrates biblical scholarship, historical theology, and practical ministry. In studying the Lord’s Prayer, I’ve also explored broader resources on prayer, and Greig’s book deeply aligns with both the theological depth and pastoral practicality that I am seeking in my research. It has become a valued resource in both my academic and ministry contexts.
A Strong Book for Many Audiences
I regularly lead small groups at Water Street Mission using video series like The Prayer Course and The Unanswered Prayer Course, developed by Pete Greig and the 24-7 Prayer Movement. In that setting, How to Pray has been an especially valuable follow-up for individuals new to faith who want to deepen their walk with God. I initially read this book in a mentoring relationship, and later revisited it as part of my doctoral research.
For me, when teaching on prayer, How to Pray is quickly becoming a new prayer classic. It gives readers a holistic understanding of prayer while remaining grounded and practical. Greig manages to offer rich insight without overwhelming readers with dense theology, making this a truly accessible yet meaningful guide.
Layout and Readability
The book is thoughtfully structured and highly readable. Its five main sections are clearly marked and broken down into short, focused chapters. Each chapter includes stories, biblical teaching, and practical takeaways. Reflection questions and discussion-friendly prompts are embedded throughout, making it perfect for group use or personal study. The layout, pacing, and tone all work together to keep readers engaged and encouraged.
How to Pray: On the Lord’s Prayer
One of the first things we find in Jesus’ teaching on prayer is that where we pray matters. Greig points out that “We are told that, prior to giving the Lord’s Prayer, ‘Jesus was praying in a certain place.’ That’s significant. There seem to have been certain places in which he preferred to pray. Elsewhere, he advised his disciples, ‘When you pray, go into your room, close the door.’ The location clearly mattered” (Greig 2019, 9–10). Prayer’s undistracted location matters for us, too. Greig also helps us realize that the order of the Lord’s Prayer is quite intentional, for use in our chosen space. It starts with a specific list of petitions, because “Before we launch into a long list of all the stuff we need— daily bread, forgiveness of sins, deliverance from evil,” Jesus “tells us to pause, to address God affectionately (‘Our Father’) and respectfully (‘hallowed be your name’)” (Greig 2019, 36). We are reconciling ourselves back to God and God’s ways.
In How to Pray, we also explore unique ways to use the Lord’s Prayer (perhaps even as a centering prayer) where we “as you sit quietly and breathe slowly, you may also find it helpful to repeat a prayer word or phrase in time with your breathing. You could say ‘Father in heaven’ while breathing in and ‘hallowed be your Name’ while breathing out” (Greig 2019, 42). This calls us to reflect on what we are saying as we center ourselves on it. Greig reminds us that this prayer does more than centering us and reconciling us, it roots us in community, noting that “the entire Lord’s Prayer is written in the plural…This is a family thing…When we pray the Lord’s Prayer, we do so corporately, in community with others” (Greig 2019, 61). This prayer connects us to others, considers others, and is best prayed with others.
Greig also points out that “It’s fascinating to note that the first half of the Lord’s Prayer was not entirely original to Jesus. He seems to have adopted and adapted the opening lines from another contemporary prayer known as the Kaddish (one of the three most important prayers in Jewish liturgy), which went like this. Magnified and hallowed be His great name. In this world which He created according to His will, and may He establish His kingdom during your life” (Greig 2019, 78). However, as Pete Greig points out, Jesus does something unique in this prayer: “Jesus softens the Kaddish’s concern with the vertical axis of God’s greatness and his impending Kingdom (‘Our Father’) and then adds his own horizontal axis: a list of simple petitions for food, safety, protection, and forgiveness. He surrounds the reverence and longing of the original prayer with relational language and practical requests regarding the everyday concerns of ordinary people” (Greig 2019, 78–79). This prayer carries with it unmatched intimacy.
Some of the language Jesus uses roots us in the stories he tells and others in the stories of the First/Old Testament that point to him. We remember that “The notion of ‘daily bread’ harks back to the Old Testament when God fed his people in the wilderness with manna that only remained fresh for a day. There is a strong sense in this phrase, therefore, of asking for today’s needs rather than tomorrow’s want” (Greig 2019, 81). In this prayer, we are reconciled with contentment in God as our provider.
It is also a prayer we don’t just pray but live out. In praying this prayer, “We yearn for our friends to know Jesus. Our lives take the shape of a single prayer: ‘Your kingdom come’” (Greig 2019, 99). We want the Kingdom to transform our lives, but even more the places we live, work, worship, and play—and our friends in each sphere of influence.
Then comes the challenging part of the prayer. As Pete Greig state, “at last we come to the hardest, most challenging line of the entire Lord’s Prayer…‘as we forgive those who sin against us.’” we face “the only line of the Lord’s Prayer that carries a big, fat caveat. If we won’t forgive, we won’t be forgiven” (Greig 2019, 169). It’s a radical statement. We face that “The word forgive has similar commercial connotations, literally meaning ‘to wipe the slate clean,’” something that doesn’t come easily for many of us, especially me (Greig 2019, 170). Greig challenges us that “This is how the cycles of hatred can be broken. It’s what he models for us on the cross, praying, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’” (Greig 2019, 180). This is a prayer for reconciliation—not just in this line, but reconciliation with God, with God’s Kingdom, with each other, with ourselves, and with our mission in the world. Greig writes, “The Lord’s Prayer is a cry for reconciliation at every level—in our broken relationship with God, in our broken relationships with one another, and in our broken relationship with the world” (Greig 2019, 180).
Though the prayer concludes with a disconcerting “cry for help and the alarming word evil, which isn’t the way you’re supposed to conclude great creedal prayers,” states Greig, but perhaps this is why “The early church took it upon themselves to add a doxology, partly, I suspect, just to round things off on a less alarming note” (Greig 2019, 192–193). It is in the doxology that we say Amen, bringing our reconciliatory acts and words full circle. And though “these final lines don’t feature in the original Gospel renditions, but they’ve been used to conclude the Lord’s Prayer since the very earliest days of the church and, significantly, they are drawn directly from King David, who prayed: ‘Yours, Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the majesty and the splendor, for everything in heavens and earth is yours. Yours, Lord, is the kingdom’” (Greig 2019, 213). It is a fitting way, even if not an original way, to bring the prayer to a close and full circle at the same time.
This prayer and its closing line are an act of surrendering the little empires we’ve built, whether in family, ministry, or career—and remembering that it all belongs to the Lord. This doxology ends with Amen, a way of concluding the prayer that echoes ancient Hebrew, literally meaning yes, we agree, let it be this way, and I will work to make it happen. Greig writes, “When we say ‘Amen’ at the end of the Lord’s Prayer, we are saying ‘yes’ to God’s Fatherhood and ‘count me in’ to his family. We are agreeing with God’s people around the world that his Kingdom would come and his will would be done” (Greig 2019, 219). In other words, we are revisiting each line and saying “Let it be so” to each act or petition.
Conclusion and Recommendation
Pete Greig has become widely known as a man of prayer, having authored half a dozen books on the subject, released video courses, and more. In How to Pray, he offers a relevant and transformative guide for anyone seeking to grow in prayer, whether they’re just beginning or looking to renew an old rhythm. It is good to read and revisit. The stories, creative suggestions, and the way Greig weaves together biblical insight and church history make this book especially helpful for those longing for a simple, structured way to deepen their connection with God. I highly recommend it for use in small groups, one-on-one discipleship, and personal spiritual formation. In a world that is often loud and chaotic, Greig extends a quiet, clear, and Spirit-led invitation into prayer, one that feels both ancient and refreshingly new.
