Poor Praying

To truly be an ""Ineffective Christian,"" prayer has to disappear from our lives. That is not to say that some reverent looking act accompanied by some solemn sounding words spoken in ""King-James English"" cannot remain. However, prayer as God presents it to us in the Bible cannot exist.

That's said easily enough, but is it true, and if so, why? What is it about prayer that makes it so antithetical to the ""Ineffective Christian?"" Effectively and sincerely praying to God grows faith by encouraging a reliance and trust in Him. Secondly, and just as important, it causes change, change in ourselves and change in the world about us. When a Christian grows in faith and sees the power of prayer at work, it becomes increasingly difficult to be ""ineffective.""

First of all, let's deal with the issue of faith. We live in a world of hard fact. ""Measure it, weigh it, analyze it."" If we can just dissect it enough we can understand it; that is our theory at any rate. We live in a wonderful age where medical marvels occur and technological advances make life more comfortable and enjoyable. Unfortunately, it's very easy to start looking to science instead of looking to God.

Prayer is one way we acknowledge God's presence and influence in our lives. Jude gives the admonition, ""build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit."" (Jude 1:20 NIV) Praying builds faith by forcing us to stop the hustle and bustle of life for a few minutes and focus on God. In those minutes we re-center ourselves and affirm that God is in Heaven and is in control. It also demonstrates to ourselves, if to no one else, that we believe in God more than we believe in ourselves. In other words, we believe the Creator knows better than the created.

The downside to technology and modern convenience is that we start to look to technology and science for answers they can't possibly provide. At some point we will come to realize this. Until then God will wait for us to ask Him for help.

Secondly, ""Ineffective Christians"" don't pray because the fact of the matter is that sincere and fervent prayer causes things to happen. In the Bible prayer was not just some psychological exercise that made the person praying feel better. Prayer was a power tool that the servant of God was given to communicate with the King Himself.

Today, to ask someone for their prayers, or to say ""you are in our prayers"" is something akin to saying ""we're thinking of you."" While it is true that prayer involves thought, it is to grossly short-change the gift of prayer to limit it to an expression of sentiment. It is a concept that is foreign to the Bible.

In James 5:16 it says, ""The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much."" Jesus believed prayer could accomplish much; He spent His final hours of freedom praying for the strength to accomplish what He had been sent to do (Luke 22). His prayer was answered . . . ultimately answering our prayers.

If we take the time to look, we see the power of answered prayer in our own lives as well. It may not always be the answer we wanted, but then what child has ever known what was best for them? Of course, sometimes it's easy to ignore the answers, especially when they're positive. I lucked into a great job, the tornado just missed our house, the cancer just happened to go into remission . . . Men are fickle things and what weighed so heavily on our minds a few days ago isn't even a glint in our eye today. We would be terribly upset if our children were so unappreciative.

Praying as it is presented in the N.T. and being an ""Ineffective Christian"" are by their very natures mutually exclusive. Prayer doesn't have to be cut off immediately. A gradual lack of attention and sincerity will suffice. Our daily lives can give us more than enough to keep our minds occupied on other things than prayer, and our souls pointed in other directions than Heaven.