As Christians, we have great respect for the name of Jesus. We are taught to pray in His Name to the Father, and this is correct.
However, I don't think we really understand what that means. We tend to tack it on before the 'Amen' as sort of a spiritual rabbit's foot...'gee, I really hope this works!'
To get a deeper understanding of what it means to pray 'in Jesus Name' we must grasp the truth that we are one Spirit with the Lord. We pray in His Name because it's our name, too--we are His Body in the earth! When He approaches the Father, I'm pretty sure He is heard and receives any request He might make.
But wait...we're not coming to the Father in our name, or by our righteousness...we're coming in our new position! We're in Him, and He's in us, and we bear His name because we are one with Him. So when we come, praying according to the Father's will as laid out in the Word, we know that we are heard.
'This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.' [1 John 5:14,15]
How do we know His will? His Word is His will. Don't ask anything that goes against His Word...it's that simple. [see Anything?]
Of course, there are always the blanket prayers in John 14-17 to cover things not in His Word...but His Word gives us the parameters within which to live and pray.
So when you pray, pray from your new position in Christ Jesus--one Spirit with the Lord, His Body in the earth, in His name
