There is a trend in conversation today, actually
going on for quite some time, when people are
discussing the trials and tragedies of the
suffering. To express sympathy and concern for
the plight of another someone may say, “My
prayers are with you” or “Our prayers are going
out to them.” Maybe it’s just me but it seems
akin to telling the downtrodden “good luck”,
“best wishes” or “I’m thinking about you”, with
just a smidgen of religion thrown in. There
seems to be a hesitancy to say the words, “I am
praying for you.”
For the child of God, prayers do not “go out” to
people. We pray for people! Our prayers are not
“with” these folks. Our prayers are for these
folks. They leave our hearts and lips and are
“sent out” to the one we’re addressing—God our
Father. He is, as Francis Schaeffer put it, “the
God who is there”. Prayer is our expression of
praise and thanksgiving to that God. Prayer is
requests and supplications to the giver of all
good things. Prayer is intercession on behalf of
others. Prayer is talking to God about the pains
and joys in our lives as we ask for his
blessings and protection.
When we pray to God we should have the
confidence that he hears us every bit as much as
the person sitting next to us, even more so. He
not only hears what we say, he knows the deep
yearnings of the heart behind what we say
(Romans 8:26-27). When we pray to God from a
true and sincere heart we know that he gives ear
to that prayer. The Bible says, “The
Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who
call on him in truth” (Psalm 145:18).
When we pray to God we pour our hearts out to
him because of our needs and the needs of
others. All people are weak and feeble when they
are left to their own devices. God knows that.
He knows that before we pray. But when we pray
we are reminded of and acknowledge our weakness.
The Bible says, “Since then we
have a great high priest who has passed through
the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold
fast our confession. For we do not have a high
priest who is unable to sympathize with our
weaknesses, but one who in every respect has
been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us
then with confidence draw near to the throne of
grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace
to help in time of need” (Hebrews
4:14-16).
We believe in the power of prayer because we
believe in the God who hears and answers prayer.
But we must not see God as some trick performer
or genie in a bottle. Dorothy Sayers wrote, “A
logical fallacy attends all ingenious proposals
to ‘test the efficacy of prayer’ by (for
example) praying for the patients in Ward A of a
hospital and leaving Ward B unprayed for, in
order to see which set recovers. Prayer
undertaken in that spirit is not prayer at all,
and it requires a singular naiveté to imagine
that Omniscience could be so easily bamboozled.”
Jesus answered Satan’s temptation to jump off
the temple with “You shall not
put the Lord your God to the test”
(Matthew 4:7). Putting God to the test is not
just doing something stupid and seeing if he’ll
come through for you. We have put God to the
test when we give up on him because he didn’t
give us what we wanted. No responsible mother or
father gives their children all they ask for.
There are at least a couple of good reasons for
this. First, when you get everything, you
appreciate nothing. Second, a mature parent
knows what his or her child needs more than the
child does. Some things they ask for may be
harmful to them even though they can’t see it.
Some things may hinder the greater good the
parent has in mind. If we know this is true in
the parent-child relationship, how much more
between ourselves and God?
God bless you,
Brad Fry
