This week I’ve been thinking a bit about prayer, partly because of a certain prayer service that took place in Washington this week and was attended by a world leader who isn’t as powerful as it seems he imagines he is, and partly because of a question I was asked recently relating to whether or not it was selfish to pray.
The question was was one that it was reasonable to pose, given how it was phrased in the context of someone praying to get a specific job. For in the event of that person subsequently being gainfully employed, wouldn’t it mean that there would be others who would necessarily be left out of work and, therefore, terribly disappointed as a result?
But before reflecting on that particular dilemma, it is perhaps worth noting that prayer ought not be primarily about requests for our physical needs. For if the Lord’s Prayer is anything to go by, and surely it should be, only about ten percent of what we pray about should relate to such things as our need for daily bread [Matthew 6:9-13].
So unless we ignore Jesus’ teaching on the subject, and foolishly embrace a health, wealth, and prosperity gospel, the bulk of our prayer life should instead be concerned with the needs of others whilst we ourselves respond to God’s holiness by recognising our own need for forgiveness, seeking an increasing righteousness for ourselves, and submitting more fully to his perfect, and all wise, sovereign rule.
Having said that, however, it’s not wrong for us to petition the one from whom all good things come [James 1:17], indeed the scriptures encourage us to do just that when they exhort us to ‘not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let [our] requests be made known to God.’ [Philippians 4:6]
And so we must return to the question that I was originally posed. Because whilst most of what I might ask God for would not, if granted by him, have a negative outcome on others, some of my requests, on the face of it at least, most certainly could. Is it then selfish to pray for these things?
I don’t think so – and here’s why.
Far from it being selfish to pray such prayers, it would, if anything, be arrogant not to, since to fail to pray would be to foolishly imagine that we are in control of the universe when it is patently obvious that that is not the case. Because it is God who is in ultimate control.
Prayer then is humbling. Because in so doing we are acknowledging that, in and of ourselves, we are weak and in need of help. We pray asking not that our will be done but the will of Him who, because his wisdom is infinitely greater than ours, knows so much better than we do what’s best and will, therefore, bring about things which, though sometimes contrary to what we want, are always exactly what we need.
So whilst when we pray it’s right that we bring our concerns to our loving Heavenly Father, we do so whilst at the same time gladly submitting to his good and perfect will even, that is, when it involves suffering.
Because let’s face it, bad things happen – and not just to those without faith. They happen to Christians too. What’s more, when those bad things do happen, we will sometimes have been calling on God to prevent them from ever taking place.
Perhaps we will have been praying for someone’s healing, for hostilities to come to an end, or for the life circumstances of someone we love to dramatically change.
But for reasons that we currently can not comprehend, rather than answering our petitions in the way we would like, God not infrequently choses to act differently to how we would have chosen.
And so, when the death occurs, the war carries relentlessly on, or our loved one’s problems continue unabated, there are, in the words of the song, ‘a million candles burning for the help that never came.’
But, as Leonard Cohen continued,
‘There’s a lover in the story
But the story’s still the same
There’s a lullaby for suffering
And a paradox to blame
But it’s written in the scriptures
And it’s not some idol claim’
He may be known as the godfather of gloom, but Leonard Cohen is right! Because scripture does indeed reassure us that, though our sorrow remains, we can, by faith, know that God’s actions are always loving.
Christians will sometimes talk about how God has a wonderful plan for their lives. Which is true. But some will then spend their whole lives trying to determine what that plan might be.
But to do so is a tragic mistake because, whilst He will no doubt have a hidden purpose for each and every one of us, one that will only become apparent over time, God’s revealed plan for our lives is to make us all more like Jesus.
Which I hope you’ll agree is a pretty fantastic one and all the more so given how he has promised to one day bring it to fruition. [Philippians 1:6]
Those who recognise God’s love, will therefore ask him to make them more loving. Those who recognise God’s mercy, will ask him to make them more merciful, and those that recognise God’s sovereignty will recognise just how relatively unimportant they are.
Far then from being the prayers and attitudes of those who are proud and arrogant, those who, somewhat alarmingly, don’t feel the need to be reminded of such things and who, we’re told, God opposes, [1 Peter 5:5], these are the prayers and attitudes of the humble, those who consider others as more significant than they are themselves, and those who, knowing they haven’t a prayer, know that prayer is all that they have.
Prayer then, when fuelled by faith at least, is not selfish – rather it’s a confident leaning on God as we learn to recognise that, rather than we ourselves, it is God who is God, and that He can be trusted in ever circumstance, no matter how desperate it may currently appear.
Because He’s the only one with real power.
Related posts:
To read ‘When Bad Things Happen’, click here
To read ‘Weeping with those who weep’, click here
To read ‘Still weeping with those who weep’, click here
To read ‘All’s Well that Ends Well’, click here
To read ‘on the FALLEN and the FELLED’, click here
To read ‘When our joy will be complete’, click here
To read ‘What becomes of the broken hearted? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Palm Sunday’, click here
To read ‘Why do bad things happen to good people? Sorrowful yet always rejoicing on Good Friday’, click here
To read ‘Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things? Rejoicing, though temporarily sorrowful, on Easter Day’, click here.
To read ‘T.S. Eliot, Jesus and the Paradox of the Christian Life’, click here
To read ‘Monsters’, click here
To read ‘On Sleeping like a Baby’, click here
To read “Hope comes from believing the promises of God”, click here
To read ‘Reflections on the death of Leonard Cohen’, click here
Some musings 