Praying is often a private affair between a person and their Heavenly Father. Praying is a form of communication, one that should always be earnest and humble, but what about how to pray? Do you close your eyes when praying, or can you keep your eyes open?
Do You Close Your Eyes When Praying?
When praying, it’s important to focus on your thoughts, but sometimes, activities going on around you such as noise or other worldly distractions can often make that a bit difficult. Closing one’s eyes when praying is something that many people do to encourage concentration. For others, it’s a way to show humbleness when speaking to God, which is exactly what prayer is – a communication with Our Heavenly Father.
While some people close their eyes while they pray, others keep them open, some looking toward the sky or heaven, others gazing at the magnificence of His creation around them, and others when watching some of His creatures cavorting about.
When it comes to what’s right and what’s expected, or ‘how to pray’, the answers you get may be quite broad depending on who you ask. For example, the Holy Scriptures don’t tell us that we must close our eyes. Yes, closing one’s eyes when you pray can help you develop a deeper, richer way of praying because you can often focus more on exactly what you want to say.
That being said, many images, paintings and artwork portray the disciples, Old Testament figures, and even God’s Son our Lord Jesus Christ and Savior, praying while looking, eyes open, toward heaven.
The New Testament book of John (17:1) tells us that “Jesus spoke these words, lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said: Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You…”
Numerous instances in the New Testament make mention of those saying a prayer looking upward, so it is perfectly suitable for you to do so as well. Yet praying with your eyes closed is also perfectly acceptable.
For some, closing the eyes is another way of honoring the glory and benevolence of God Our Father and His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ when asking for something, whatever it may be, or making a confession of a sin or a fault.
The important part of praying is to have the faith and belief that God hears your prayer.
What Does the Bible Tell Us About Praying and About How to Pray?
The Holy Scriptures have a lot to say about praying. Prayer, at its most basic description, is a request, comment, or blessing to God. There are many different kinds of prayer. Prayers can be spoken out loud or silently. They can be given when you’re standing up, walking, driving, or inside or outside, on your knees… you can pray whenever and wherever you like. The same goes for keeping your eyes open or closing them while you pray.
The only requirements made of you and praying is that you do so with purity of heart. Psalms 66:18-19, tells us, ‘If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear. But certainly God has heard me; He has attended to the voice of my prayer. Blessed be God, who has not turned away my prayer, nor His mercy from me.’
What matters is not how we position ourselves or whether we keep our eyes open or closed, it is to be honest, forthright, and humble. After all, God is all-knowing. He knows what is in your heart, so there is no point in hiding anything from Him.
So, the question of ‘do you close your eyes when praying’, is not what a believer should be focused on. Belief in Christ’s name is, and is also a personal requirement of prayer. In the book of John (John 15:13- 14) Jesus Christ Himself tells us ‘And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask anything in My name, I will do it. If you love Me, keep My commandments, and I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.”
So, it’s not so much how to pray, what we look like when we pray, but the truth of our request of Him and our faith and belief that all will be done according to God’s will and not our own.
Do You Close Your Eyes When Praying?
Do you close your eyes when praying? You can if you want to! It doesn’t mean though, that if you close your eyes, God will automatically think you’re putting more effort into your prayer. Closing your eyes is more for you and your focus than it is for Him. Remember, God wants to hear from us at any time of the day, as many times during the day that we want to pray, and most importantly, he wants to know what’s in our hearts and minds.
If you close your eyes when praying, does it mean you’ll have a better chance of him answering or granting your request of Him? That’s up to God. Not us. Sometimes, God doesn’t give us what we’ve asked for because it’s self-serving or selfish. Sometimes it’s because when we prayed, our hearts were filled with doubt. Often, it’s because we humans can often be too prideful or disobedient.
The Old Testament provides a number of examples of postures that are taken during prayer, from sitting to standing, kneeling, bowing our heads, or hands uplifted. The important thing is the prayer itself.
When you believe with your whole heart and have faith in your Heavenly Father and His Son Jesus Christ, and you pray in earnestness, humbleness, and honestly yearn for His guidance and benevolence, your prayers are heard. Do you close your eyes when praying? That doesn’t matter as much as the truth to be found in your heart when you pray.
