“Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving…” (Colossians 4:2)
Consider praying in concentric circles from your own soul outward to the whole world. This is my regular practice. I pray for my own soul first. Not because I am more deserving than others, but because if God doesn’t awaken and strengthen and humble and fill my own soul, then I can’t pray for anybody else’s. So I plead with the Lord every morning for my own soul’s perseverance and purification and power.
Then I go to the next concentric circle, my family, and I pray for each of them by name.
Then I go to the next concentric circle, the elders, leaders and people of the local church.
And then I go out from there to different concerns and groups at different times: our missionaries, our denomination and its schools, evangelicalism in general and the church around the world, especially the suffering church. The wider circles include the city and the state and the nation and the cultural and social issues of the world.
You can’t pray for everything every time. So there need to be differences. And your heart will dictate much of your burden, Some days one family member or one staff member or one crisis in the church or the world will consume most of your time. But if you have a pattern-like the concentric circles—you won’t spin your wheels wondering where to start.
It is that simple and that practical: Begin close and pray in widening circles.
– John Piper (adapted)