Sense & Nonsense About Prayer

What It Is, What It's Not, How It Works

11. The Beginning of Wisdom

The Bible says that the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom [Psalm 111:10]. By “fear,” what the word means is “Holy reverence for who God is and for what He can do.” The problem with so many Christians these days is we simply no longer fear God. Which is odd, considering the terrible evidence of global warming, the great climactic disasters we’ve suffered and continue to suffer, and the terrible political turmoil going on in the world. In these desperate economic times, these times of war and famine and disease, so many “Christians” still continue to tempt God by living lives that are not markedly different from the way so-called “sinners” live. Sexual impurity is, likely, chief among our sins, but our biggest sin is likely intolerance of one another. Running our big mouths constantly, tearing one another down with gossip. Stabbing one another in the back just so we can feel better about ourselves.

All of this undermines the effectiveness of our prayers. And there’s absolutely no sense getting mad at God when He doesn’t perform the way we want Him to.

12. Let God Do His Job

Perhaps the biggest mistake we make in our prayer life is we want to tell God not only what we want or what we need but in what manner He should act. We say, “Lord, please talk to my boss and make him give me a raise.” This limits God’s options. We’re tying God’s hands because we’ve so narrowed down the course of action that His response is often, “no.” For if He did, specifically, what we asked him to do, chances are that would harm us in some way, somewhere down the road. The worst thing God can imagine is us becoming separated from Him. His only motive in denying our request is preventing that separation from occurring. He desires for us to dwell with Him, abide in Him. And He knows, if we get our way, many of us simply wouldn’t be able to handle the very life change we’re asking for. It would corrupt us and cripple our relationship with God.

Don’t direct God. Don’t tie Him up in knots. The proper way to pray is not to pray for a specific action but pray for a need. Rather than pray that God would change your boss’ mind, pray that God would meet your household’s needs. A more appropriate prayer is, “Lord, we need help managing our finances. Please open doors and please give us the wisdom to see those doors opened and the courage to step through them.” This gives God a lot more options to provide creative solutions to your problems, solutions that may have absolutely nothing to do with your boss. Many of us are impatient. We help God out by taking matters into our own hands instead of being patient and trusting Him. We pray for the solution but we fail to pray for the wisdom to actually see and know the solution when it’s right in front of us.

Most of our prayers fail because we pray for the wrong things. And, not only that, but we dictate to God the manner in which He should accomplish those things.

13. Keep The Line Open

At this camp I was taught to pray when I got up in the morning. To pray about what to wear. Which socks. Lord, which tie should I put on? To pray while I’m brushing my teeth. To pray while walking across the field to the chapel. I was taught to keep the line open. Too many of us close prayers with “Amen,” a practice we should stop doing because, in our mindset, “Amen” ends the prayer. Which is not true. “Amen” simply means “certainly” or “so let it be.” It does not mean, “Our connection to God is hereby closed.”

We should start prayer when our eyes open. “What would You have me to do today, God?” And leave off the “Amen.” Just leave the connection open. All day. Every day. Don’t worry about tying up the line—He’s never too busy for you.

Praying over what dress to wear or what jacket to put on may seem trifling and stupid. There are no trifling or stupid matters to your Holy Father. And if you’d invite Him into even these choices and decisions, you will begin to walk in the Spirit [Galatians 5:16]. You’ll begin to invoke the presence of the Holy Spirit in every move you make. And that will not only greatly improve your walk with God, but it will exponentially improve the effectiveness of your prayers.

By keeping the connection open, there’ll be music you won’t listen to. If God’s in the car with you, you won’t be listening to music that requires “Explicit Content” warnings. You’ll be less likely to grieve the Holy Spirit by watching moronic idiocy like “Flava of Love” and other idiot shows designed to showcase how stupid black people are. If your Holy Father is in the room with you, you’re much less likely to take that man or that woman you’re not married to to bed.

14. Give God Time

One of the reasons our prayers are ineffective si we say what we came to say and get up, going about our day. we're too much in a hurry, too distracted by the concerns of the day. When we pray, we need to stop talking and listen—really listen—to what God is saying. Give Him time to speak to us, to inspire us and lead us to the answers we are seeking.

15. Already Answered

Finally, the most tragic product of a poor prayer life is our spiritual blinders. God has, quite often, already answered our prayer and we don’t even know it. We’re busy looking for the burning bush or the sign in the sky. But that’s not how God moves. God moves as often through motivation as through demonstration. He simply brings things to pass that He is motivated to bring to pass. And the answers we are seeking are, more often than not, already here. We’re just walking past and ignoring them because we’re not spiritually in tune with God. We're expecting God to move in a way we ourselves have outlined for Him.

The worst thing a detective can have is an opinion. Having an opinion about who done it blinds the detective to the evidence before him. At the outset, it may lo kike it was Professor Plumb in the study with an ice pick. But a good detective leaves his opinion of such matters at home and follows the evidence to, perhaps, the maid in the kitchen with a screwdriver.

When we bring our opinion, our vision, of how God should move and when God should move, we set up expectations that are likely to be disappointed. It blinds us to seeing how God has already moved. How He has already worked things out in our favor. We can’t see it because we’ve brought our process, our opinion, into the matter. When we should approach the things of God with an open mind, praying not only for our needs to be met but for the wisdom to know that they have and the patience to wait.

Christopher J. Priest
4 June 2006
editor@praisenet.org
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Ways And Means

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I had lunch with a friend the other day who, as she always does, continued to twist my arm trying to convince me to join her church. Now, I’m going to be careful because she tends to browse through here every now and then, but it is worth noting that I’ve been affiliated with her church, in one capacity or another, for fifteen years. So much so that the notion of her (a) referring to it as “her” church and (b) twisting my arm to join it just amuses me to no end. It goes completely without question or challenge that I’ve been an integral party of that ministry for nearly one-third of my life now. Her major complaint seems to be that I am not there on Sundays. “Well,” I asked, “What would I do there on Sundays? What purpose would that serve?” They already have a bunch of preachers. A bunch of musicians and singers. A bunch of deacons and ushers and dancers and administrative staff and people who run the vacuum after service is over. How would my physically being there on Sunday be anything but redundant. “You accomplish a great deal simply by being there,” she replied. Which is a good point. Here’s mine:

For those of us with a calling on our lives, simply being there is not enough. We need to be where we are sent. I spend, on average, between 30 and 50 hours per week involved with "her" church. God has not directed me to be there Sunday mornings. “You don’t have to always be down front,” my friend admonished, “you could come and just sit.” Just sit. First of all, even at my own church, I am rarely down front. My co-pastor and I are busy, from the moment we get there. Second, it would never occur to me to ask her pastor to leave his pulpit Sunday morning to come watch me perform my ministry and just sit. Because, while he’s just sitting, the work God has ordained for his hands is not being accomp-lished. Sure, his just being there would, I suppose, somehow be pleasing to me and others I serve with, but it would be both selfish and impractical, and it would ultimately violate the covenant this pastor has made with God. “God has granted me these gifts,” Gospel soul singer Adrianne Archie said in our interview. “For me to not use them would be irresponsible.”

I'm a pastor —something else my friend disagrees with, as I’ve recently dis-solved the remnants our downtown ministry. “You’re not a pastor,” she said, as if an airline captain stops being a pilot between flights. As if, every single day, she couldn’t see with her own eyes, hold in her own hands, evidence of God’s anointing and the effective work I do at “her” church. It’s dangerous to go around demoting God’s generals. You tempt God by calling Him a liar, which is why I give honor to even the most patently ridiculous and brazenly un-Christlike “pastors,” because it is simply not my place to say that they are not. I’ve been pastoring for over thirty years. Sunday is a work day. As God gives me the occasional Sunday off, it is my great pleasure to visit with others—to go and sit in any one of the hundreds of churches here. But those days off are few and far between. Simply being there is not enough. If you have the call, you have to be where you are needed, where you are called to. You have to be effective.

As a professional writer (which I’m sure she doubts as well), I’ve learned that, in order to be a good editor, you have to be an at least mediocre writer. In order to recognize good writing, you yourself must, on some level, be capable of it. Otherwise you just hire your buddies and publish a bunch of bad stuff. The same is true of Christian ministry. In order to recognize anointing, you yourself need to experience it. Your relationship with God (or lack thereof) will ultimately tell on you.

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