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Maybe you’ve wondered if you’re doing it wrong. Eyes closed or open? Kneeling, sitting, standing? Hands folded, or lifted up? When you’re tired and your head is full, even starting to pray can feel like a test you might fail.
So it makes sense to ask: how did Jesus pray? If anyone did it right, he did. And the Gospels do tell us. They show him looking up, kneeling, and lying face down on the ground.
But when you read closely, the thing they keep telling you about isn’t how Jesus held his body. It’s where he went. And one small verse shows just how regular that was. It was so regular that the one man who meant to hurt him knew exactly where to find him.
How did Jesus pray? The positions the Gospels actually record
Let’s start with what people are really searching for: the physical side. Here is every kind of prayer position the Gospels give Jesus, all in the King James Version.
He looked up. At the tomb of his friend Lazarus, “Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me” (John 11:41). He did it again the night before he died: “These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come” (John 17:1). When he fed the five thousand, “looking up to heaven, he blessed them, and brake” (Luke 9:16).
He knelt. On the Mount of Olives, “he was withdrawn from them about a stone’s cast, and kneeled down, and prayed” (Luke 22:41).
He fell to the ground. Matthew tells the same night this way: “he went a little farther, and fell on his face, and prayed” (Matthew 26:39). Mark says he “fell on the ground” (Mark 14:35).
And standing was normal. When Jesus taught about prayer, he simply assumed his listeners stood: “And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any” (Mark 11:25). He didn’t correct it. He took it for granted.
Look at those again and a pattern shows up. When Jesus was giving thanks or blessing food, his eyes went up. On the worst night of his life, his whole body went down. The position followed what was going on inside him. There was no one required pose.
That should take some pressure off. If you’ve ever prayed lying in bed, or on a bus, or with your face in your hands, you haven’t broken a rule Jesus kept.
What Luke keeps telling you instead: where Jesus went
Luke’s Gospel pays special attention to Jesus praying. It notices him praying at moments where Matthew and Mark don’t mention prayer at all. He was praying at his baptism when “the heaven was opened” (Luke 3:21). He prayed all night before he chose the twelve (Luke 6:12). And he was praying when his face changed on the mountain: “as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered” (Luke 9:29).
Here’s what’s easy to miss. Luke almost never tells you how Jesus’s body was positioned. But again and again, Luke tells you where he was:
- “he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed” (Luke 5:16)
- “he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God” (Luke 6:12)
- “as he was alone praying” (Luke 9:18)
- he “went up into a mountain to pray” (Luke 9:28)
- “as he was praying in a certain place” (Luke 11:1)
Mark adds the time of day: “in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed” (Mark 1:35). The quiet didn’t last long. His friends came looking and told him, “All men seek for thee” (Mark 1:37). He didn’t hide from them. He went back out with them to the next towns. The quiet place was where he got ready for people, not where he escaped from them. (We looked at that side of the story in why God’s quiet seasons in Scripture always have a door.)
The detail most people read past: Judas knew the place
Now come to the last week of Jesus’s life. Luke gives us a small line about how Jesus spent those nights: “And in the day time he was teaching in the temple; and at night he went out, and abode in the mount that is called the mount of Olives” (Luke 21:37).
Then, on the night of the Last Supper: “And he came out, and went, as he was wont, to the mount of Olives” (Luke 22:39). “As he was wont” is old English for as he usually did. It was his habit.
John tells us how regular that habit was, and the verse is hard to read slowly:
“And Judas also, which betrayed him, knew the place: for Jesus ofttimes resorted thither with his disciples.” (John 18:2)
Judas didn’t need to follow Jesus that night. He didn’t need a spy. He just knew. Jesus had gone to that same garden so many times that everyone in his circle knew where he’d be.
And John has already shown us that Jesus knew what Judas was about to do (John 13:21-27). Judas had walked out of the supper, “and it was night” (John 13:30). Jesus could have gone anywhere. He went to his usual place anyway. The habit held on the one night it cost him the most.
Even Judas knew where Jesus prayed. That’s how regular it was.
Why the place matters more than the position
Think about how prayer really falls apart for most of us. It’s rarely because we held our hands the wrong way. It’s because the day starts, the phone lights up, someone needs us, and prayer never gets a turn. It has nowhere to happen, so it doesn’t.
Your position is what you do once you’re there. A place is what gets you there on the days you don’t feel like it. Jesus didn’t have to decide every night where to go. He already knew. The decision was made long before the hard night came.
His teaching points the same way. “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret” (Matthew 6:6). He doesn’t give a pose there either. He gives a place and a closed door.
And look at what came from Jesus’s own habit. “As he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray” (Luke 11:1). His friends had watched him go to a place and pray. They waited until he stopped. Then they asked. The Lord’s Prayer came out of a habit someone else noticed.
Notice too what Jesus’s places were. A hillside. The wilderness. An olive grove outside the city. None of them cost money. None of them needed a spare room or a quiet house. If you share a small home, work long shifts, or never get the place to yourself, you are not shut out of this. Your place might be:
- the same chair, before anyone else is up
- the first ten minutes of your walk to work or to the market
- a bathroom with the door shut
- a bench, a stairwell, a back step, the edge of a field
- the same seat on the same bus, looking out the window
It doesn’t need to be beautiful. It needs to be the place you keep going back to. Once you’re there, pray however your heart is that day. Look up if you’re thankful. Put your head down if it’s heavy. (And if tears come when you get there, that’s not a sign you’re doing it wrong either.)
If you don’t know what to say once you get to your place, you can try our free Prayer Anywhere assistant (it opens in ChatGPT). Tell it what’s going on, and it will help you find words for any moment.
How to pray like Jesus, starting today
- Pick your place right now. Not the perfect one. The one you can actually reach tomorrow. Say it out loud: “My place is ___.”
- Tie it to something you already do. Choose one daily moment that always happens, like waking up, boiling water, leaving the house, or sitting down on the bus. That’s when you go to your place. Write the place and the moment on a scrap of paper and put it where you’ll see it in the morning.
- Go tomorrow, before the first thing that asks for you. Five minutes is enough. Don’t worry about your position. Just be there, tell God honestly what’s on your heart, and stop when you’re done. If someone interrupts, go to them. Jesus did too. Then go back to your place the next day.
Journaling prompts
- When prayer has slipped out of your days in the past, what usually crowded it out first?
- Where do you already feel a little quieter inside, even for a minute? What is it about that place?
- If someone close to you had to guess where you meet God, what would they say, and how does that answer make you feel?
A prayer for today
God, I’ve spent a lot of time worrying about whether I’m praying the right way. Today I just want somewhere to meet you. Help me find one ordinary place and keep coming back to it, even on the days I’m tired or I don’t feel anything. When my heart is thankful, let me look up. When it’s heavy, let me be honest about that. Make this place so familiar that I don’t have to decide to come. I just come. Amen.
Let’s talk
The Gospels show Jesus praying in many different positions, but they keep coming back to the places he went. Do you think having a regular place to pray matters more than how you pray, or does it depend on the person? Share your thoughts in the comments. We’d love to hear from you.
If you’d like help building a daily time with Jesus that actually sticks, the free 3-day sample of 30 Days Walking with Jesus gives you a short video, audio, and page for each day. It’s a simple way to give your new place something to hold.
Share this
- “John 18:2 says Judas knew where to find Jesus, because Jesus prayed there so often. I’ve been worried about how I pray. Maybe I should worry more about where.”
- “Jesus looked up when he was thankful and fell on his face when he was in anguish. There’s no one right way to hold your body when you pray.”
- “I used to think prayer failed because I wasn’t doing it right. Turns out it failed because it never had a place to happen. Found my chair. Going back tomorrow.”
Questions people ask about how Jesus prayed
How did Jesus pray physically?
The Gospels record Jesus praying in several positions. He lifted up his eyes to heaven when giving thanks (John 11:41, John 17:1) and when blessing food (Luke 9:16). He knelt on the Mount of Olives (Luke 22:41). Matthew 26:39 says he “fell on his face,” and Mark 14:35 says he “fell on the ground.” In Mark 11:25 Jesus also speaks of people who “stand praying” as normal. The Bible does not give one required position for prayer.
Where did Jesus go to pray?
Jesus often prayed away from crowds and alone. Mark 1:35 says he went to “a solitary place” before daylight. Luke 5:16 says he “withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed,” and Luke 6:12 says he prayed all night on a mountain. During his last week in Jerusalem, Luke 21:37 and Luke 22:39 say he spent nights on the Mount of Olives, “as he was wont,” meaning as he usually did.
How did Judas know where to find Jesus?
John 18:2 says, “And Judas also, which betrayed him, knew the place: for Jesus ofttimes resorted thither with his disciples.” Jesus went to the garden across the brook Cedron (Kidron) so often that Judas, one of his twelve disciples, knew he would be there on the night of his arrest.
What time of day did Jesus pray?
The Gospels show Jesus praying at different times. Mark 1:35 says he rose “a great while before day” to pray. Matthew 14:23 says that when evening came he was alone on a mountain praying. Luke 6:12 says he once “continued all night in prayer to God.” There is no single fixed hour in the Gospel accounts. What stands out is that Jesus set time apart, often early or late, away from the crowds.
Did Jesus teach a specific way to pray?
Yes. In Matthew 6:5-6 Jesus warned against praying to be seen by others and told his listeners to “enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret.” In Luke 11:1, after watching Jesus pray “in a certain place,” a disciple asked, “Lord, teach us to pray,” and Jesus answered with the words now known as the Lord’s Prayer.
