mark home on prayer

[thom]

by Mark Horne

I was driving down I-240 from the Saint Louis Airport to my (rather temporary) home in Fenton, Missouri, when I realized that I was an atheist.

This was not a proud moment for a seminary student who aspired to serve God in the pastorate. Thankfully, I was granted repentance.

What had happened was this: An elderly lady in the church my wife and I attended had been told that she must have her leg amputated immediately. The surgery would be radical, going all the way to her hip. We were to pray for her. That was what I was trying to do as I drove home from work that day. I was trying to pray for her.

How do you pray for someone in that situation? I prayed for her courage, for her doctor to be given wisdom and skill, for her own spiritual growth. But even praying silently I kept avoiding the H-word in my mind. I was avoiding even considering the possibility of healing, let alone praying for it. It didn’t feel right. And at some point on the drive home I asked myself (perhaps out loud): “Mark, why don’t you pray for God to heal her?”

Indeed, why not?

I had to face the fact that I was afraid. I was afraid that if I asked God to heal this lady and God answered my prayer by saying “No,” that I would have to face a crisis of faith. The reason for this crisis would be the fact that God’s answer to my prayer would be the same as what would happen if there was no god who answers prayers. If I prayed and nothing happened I would have to deal with a temptation to doubt God. By not taking the risk, I was avoiding a trial of faith.

But as soon as I confronted my fear I realized that my unconscious strategy was self-destructive. To refuse to pray is the decision of an atheist or a deist, not that of a Christian. Atheists don’t believe in God and deists believe in a world-maker who left us with a self-powered universe to which he pays no attention. Such people do not pray because prayer does nothing. Christians, on the other hand, pray because God is in control. God answers the prayers of his people. Indeed, because God is in control of the world ultimately, God’s people–through prayer and worship–are in control derivatively.

I realized two things that day. First of all, I realized that acting like a deist or an atheist was a stupid way to avoid the temptation to be a deist or an atheist. In a real sense, I was giving in to temptation ahead of time so I wouldn’t have to struggle with resisting it later. If I continued to limit my prayers to natural things that might happen anyway, I would be fostering unbelief in my heart. I can’t think of an easier way to slide into faithlessness than to act faithless while praying. Surely, letting doubt infiltrate one’s times of direct communication with God has to be a dangerous thing. Think of James’ warning:

But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all men generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways (James 1:5-7).

To craft safe easily managed prayers that only ask for things that might happen anyway does not comport well with James’ warning.

The second thing I realized is that my assurance that God is in control could easily decay into a passive fatalism. Deism is supposed to be exactly the opposite of a strong confidence that God is actively overseeing all that happens according to his wise plan. But it is quite possible for people who believe that God is in control to act exactly like Deists. Deists don’t pray because the world’s course is not affected by God. Zealots for God’s control don’t pray because they think the world’s course is set by God so that they should ever expect God to change it. The two positions seem opposite but the believers in a managing God could easily act exactly the same as a deist would. Belief that God is in control of the world degenerates into a belief that the way the world is reveals God’s plan.

As I said, God was merciful. I repented. I confessed to God that I was afraid to ask him to deliver this sister in the Lord from having her leg severed from her body. I was afraid because I He might say “No.” That was certainly his right. But it was my right and duty to beg him to do otherwise. So I was begging. Save her leg. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

God spared her leg. The next time she was examined the doctors found things weren’t so bad after all and they canceled the amputation.

[jonathan]

this was great. I have done the exact same thing - prayed "practical" prayers like a deist or atheist all the while fearing the temptation to those two viewpoints. Thanks, Thom, and amen that the woman's leg was healed!

[dteel]

Ah, yes! Careful, logical, safe prayers.......................I am guilty, too. Lord push us on to pray YOUR prayers. Remembering that we bring our requests to the KING, let us pray boldly. I return to a prayer I have prayed for 30+ years.
(often doubting that it will ever be answered!)
Thanks, Thom, for the post.