OK, we’ve gone through praise,
thanksgiving, and confession. Now we come to the last major aspect of prayer:
petition (a theological term for asking for things).
For some reason, a lot of Christians
seem to have some problem or another with this aspect. For what it’s worth,
here are some of my thoughts (based on Scripture).Some
Christians are actually uncomfortable asking our Father for anything for
themselves. They’re
really noble souls who like to praise him, thank him, and confess their sins,
and they don’t mind praying for others’ needs. Just a reminder: The very word “pray” means “to ask.” But they’re
uncomfortable asking for things for themselves. Now of course we want to keep
the proper mindset when we’re asking him for something, especially if it’s for
ourselves. That’s why I heartily recommend you spend some time praising him and
thanking him before you get to any type of petition. In fact, I like to thank
him for something related to my petition.
For
example, let’s say I’m praying for my wife’s health. I might start out with
“Father, I thank you that you are Yahweh Rapha, the God who heals us. I also
thank you so much for bringing this wonderful woman into my life. She’s such a
blessing and encouragement to me. Could you please bring her back to health, relieve
her of this pain, bring her to the other side of this quickly?” You see, before
you ask for a thing, take a moment to
praise and/or thank him.
Having said that, apparently it needs to be relayed to some folks: There's nothing intrinsically wrong in asking the Lord for
what you need or even want. There’s nothing intrinsically less noble
about asking him for things, even for ourselves. And I’m not just talking about
asking for spiritual needs, like “Lord, please make me a better follower of
Jesus. Please remove the sin in my life and help me be more pleasing and
obedient.” Yes, we definitely need that (probably more than the physical
stuff). I’m also referring to physical needs and even wants. If you need to,
read over the Matthew passage again slowly. He invites us to ask for things. He encourages us to ask for things. He wants us to ask for things.
Ask, seek, knock. You will receive.
You will find. The door will be opened to you.
But because we’re naturally selfish
and sinful and unwise, there are three caveats we need to go over.
First off, if you read the passage
again, you might notice that the latter part is talking about asking him for
things we need, not necessarily things we want. The son in his example is
asking for bread and fish, in other words, the necessities of life. There’s
nothing in this passage about asking him for steak and caviar.
But is it wrong to ask? Well, it’s
not intrinsically sinful. There’s nothing in Scripture that forbids asking him
for even the finer things in life. But I think to ask him for luxuries betrays
a sort of shallowness, a poor perspective on life.
Think about it for a moment. This isn’t rocket surgery, even if you’re not
a parent. What type of parent gives his child everything the child asks for? A
pretty poor one. Our Father is perfect, so he’s not going to give us anything
which'll harm us, which would include hindering our relationship with Christ. He'll always give us what we need. But just like with children, our definition of “need” and his definition of “need” aren’t
necessarily the same.
When we pray, we’re not uttering a
magical formula that manipulates impersonal forces to do what we desire. That
is the definition of magic. We're asking a Person for something, Someone who
knows perfectly what we need, and loves us enough to say “no” when that’s the
right answer.
And then there’s James’s discourse
on this, which brings us to the second caveat. He tells us that there are two
possible reasons why we don’t receive from God. First, it might be because you
don’t ask. But second, and more germane to what I’m getting at, he says that
even if we do ask, “[We] do not
receive, because [we] ask with wrong motives, that [we] may spend what [we] get
on [our] pleasures.” Why are you asking for X? Is it just so you can spend what
you get on your pleasure? If so, James says that’s a great reason why our
loving Father doesn’t give you what you’re asking for.
That brings us to the third reason
why he doesn’t give us what we ask for. The apostle Paul asked the Lord to take
away his “thorn” (whatever that was). Satan sent it, but apparently the Lord in
his mysterious plan ordained it behind the scenes. Paul—remember, this is the
apostle Paul here—asked the Lord three times to take it away. And the Lord said
no. No specific reason given, other than “My grace is sufficient for you, for
my power is made perfect in weakness.” In other words, I’m going to use this to
grow you by having you rely on my strength while you’re going through this.
But let’s not all these asterisks
dilute the wonderful truth here. Yes, he does answer prayer. And he loves to
say “yes.” I know I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating:
Thou
are coming to a King,
Large
petitions with thee bring;
For
his grace and power are such,
None
can ever ask too much.
--unknown
Father, I don’t want to be presumptuous,
and I don’t want to be timid. Guide me here, please, by your Spirit.
No comments:
Post a Comment