Jesus said, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you.” Matthew 7:7
I urge... that petitions, prayers, intercessions and thanksgivings be made for all people - for kings and all those in authority... 1 Timothy 2:1
I have a problem. In fact, it might be truer to say that I have a failing, a weakness, in one particular area: I am very easily distracted when I should be worshipping.
There I am in church, supposedly praying to God, or singing his praises, or listening to his word, and all sorts of other thoughts come elbowing their way into my mind.
Prayer is one of the most testing areas.
I wrote some time ago about public prayers that are over-loaded with that infuriating, maddening little non-word “just”. As in: we just want to thank, Lord, for loving us; we just want to thank you that we can be here today; we just ask you to speak to us and bless us; we just... grrr! Just stop it! There’s nothing just “just” about worshipping God!
Once or twice (Lord, forgive me - this will demonstrate just how pathetically unspiritual I am) I have even found myself totting up the number of justs throughout the course of the service (will they make it to fifty?). Oh dear!
Well, we recently visited a church where, no doubt to my shame, I discovered another source of distraction in prayer...
I think that twenty or thirty times (no exaggeration) in the course of various prayers we started by thanking God: thank you, Lord, that we can worship you today; thank you for the gift of Jesus your Son; thank you for loving us; thank you for being with us every minute of every day. And then, fifteen minutes later, another sequence of thank-you prayers pretty much identical to those already offered.
And (oh dear, this is probably seriously bad of me) I found myself wondering if God is perhaps - dare I suggest it - getting a little bit bored? I picture him up there in heaven drumming his fingers (so to speak) and saying “All, right, I am very grateful for all these thanking prayers, and I don’t doubt your sincerity in offering them. But I did actually hear them the first time, thanks very much (not to mention the second, the third, the fourth and...”).
Isn’t there a world to pray for? Isn’t there a rather alarming man sitting in the White House in America who needs our prayers? Aren’t there ordinary men, women and children suffering terribly in Syria? Aren’t there untold thousands of people around the world being persecuted for their convictions, Christian and otherwise?
Doesn’t the New Testament teach us to pray for rulers of nations, for people of influence and power? Don’t we in Britain have a prime minister who has to grapple with issues most of us wouldn’t have a clue about? (Not to mention a somewhat wacky foreign secretary?)
Let’s not forget that praying for someone doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them or approve of them; no, just that in some wonderful way our prayers can affect the way our world develops.
What about our church leaders, both local and national? Don’t they need our prayers? What about the tragedies, the crises, the tensions we read about in our papers every day? What about the gangs? The drugs? The young children soaking their minds in on-line pornography?
And what about prayers we need to pray for ourselves and our own circle? Nothing wrong in that: the Bible is full of them.
Please don’t get me wrong. Giving thanks to God is a vital part of our praying and worship. Of course. Of course! But how much thanking does God actually need or want? Have we slipped into the mistake of being so afraid of “shopping-list” praying that we forget to ask him for things?
But God delights to be asked for things! “Ask and it will be given you,” says Jesus (Matthew 7:7). He teaches us to pray that “God’s will will be done and his kingdom come on earth as in heaven”. Paul tells his protégé Timothy that “petitions, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving should be given for all people - for kings and all those in authority” (1Timothy 2:1-2). Jesus’ brother James, in finger-wagging mode, tells his readers that “you do not have because you do not ask” (James 4:2).
So... what about it? Is it just me? Am I just a far worse Christian than even I feared? I’d be interested to know if anyone out there feels the same way.
Lord, teach me to pray! Amen.
I urge... that petitions, prayers, intercessions and thanksgivings be made for all people - for kings and all those in authority... 1 Timothy 2:1
I have a problem. In fact, it might be truer to say that I have a failing, a weakness, in one particular area: I am very easily distracted when I should be worshipping.
There I am in church, supposedly praying to God, or singing his praises, or listening to his word, and all sorts of other thoughts come elbowing their way into my mind.
Prayer is one of the most testing areas.
I wrote some time ago about public prayers that are over-loaded with that infuriating, maddening little non-word “just”. As in: we just want to thank, Lord, for loving us; we just want to thank you that we can be here today; we just ask you to speak to us and bless us; we just... grrr! Just stop it! There’s nothing just “just” about worshipping God!
Once or twice (Lord, forgive me - this will demonstrate just how pathetically unspiritual I am) I have even found myself totting up the number of justs throughout the course of the service (will they make it to fifty?). Oh dear!
Well, we recently visited a church where, no doubt to my shame, I discovered another source of distraction in prayer...
I think that twenty or thirty times (no exaggeration) in the course of various prayers we started by thanking God: thank you, Lord, that we can worship you today; thank you for the gift of Jesus your Son; thank you for loving us; thank you for being with us every minute of every day. And then, fifteen minutes later, another sequence of thank-you prayers pretty much identical to those already offered.
And (oh dear, this is probably seriously bad of me) I found myself wondering if God is perhaps - dare I suggest it - getting a little bit bored? I picture him up there in heaven drumming his fingers (so to speak) and saying “All, right, I am very grateful for all these thanking prayers, and I don’t doubt your sincerity in offering them. But I did actually hear them the first time, thanks very much (not to mention the second, the third, the fourth and...”).
Isn’t there a world to pray for? Isn’t there a rather alarming man sitting in the White House in America who needs our prayers? Aren’t there ordinary men, women and children suffering terribly in Syria? Aren’t there untold thousands of people around the world being persecuted for their convictions, Christian and otherwise?
Doesn’t the New Testament teach us to pray for rulers of nations, for people of influence and power? Don’t we in Britain have a prime minister who has to grapple with issues most of us wouldn’t have a clue about? (Not to mention a somewhat wacky foreign secretary?)
Let’s not forget that praying for someone doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them or approve of them; no, just that in some wonderful way our prayers can affect the way our world develops.
What about our church leaders, both local and national? Don’t they need our prayers? What about the tragedies, the crises, the tensions we read about in our papers every day? What about the gangs? The drugs? The young children soaking their minds in on-line pornography?
And what about prayers we need to pray for ourselves and our own circle? Nothing wrong in that: the Bible is full of them.
Please don’t get me wrong. Giving thanks to God is a vital part of our praying and worship. Of course. Of course! But how much thanking does God actually need or want? Have we slipped into the mistake of being so afraid of “shopping-list” praying that we forget to ask him for things?
But God delights to be asked for things! “Ask and it will be given you,” says Jesus (Matthew 7:7). He teaches us to pray that “God’s will will be done and his kingdom come on earth as in heaven”. Paul tells his protégé Timothy that “petitions, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving should be given for all people - for kings and all those in authority” (1Timothy 2:1-2). Jesus’ brother James, in finger-wagging mode, tells his readers that “you do not have because you do not ask” (James 4:2).
So... what about it? Is it just me? Am I just a far worse Christian than even I feared? I’d be interested to know if anyone out there feels the same way.
Lord, teach me to pray! Amen.
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