EDITORIAL: Confusing, illogical, irresistible prayer

Posted: 2/02/07

EDITORIAL:
Confusing, illogical, irresistible prayer

Sometimes, technology can be a burden. These days, it shadows most of us wherever we go. E-mail piles up faster and deeper than snow in a Panhandle blizzard. Take a trip, and you come home to a stream of voicemails long enough to make your ear fall off. And don’t even get me started about programming the video recorder.

But one area of modern technology is absolutely sweet, golden, wonderful. That would be speed dialing on my cell phone. At any moment, I can punch one of three numbers, and a moment later, I’m talking to one of the three most precious women in my life—my wife and our two daughters. They’re scattered from Coppell to Waco to Orlando. But thanks to cellular technology, their voices are never more than seconds away.

Maybe my mind is quirky, but I thought about my love affair with four cell phones—mine, and Joanna’s, Lindsay’s and Molly’s—as I contemplated our feature story in this edition of the paper. In a way (and I know this is a mundane analogy), prayer is very much like cellular technology. Hard as it is to imagine when I think about how much I love talking to my three girls, prayer is even better. Can you comprehend the significance of prayer? You can pause, redirect your thoughts and, in an instant, converse with the Creator of the universe, God Almighty.

Seems like I’ve been praying all my life. In fact, I can’t remember a time when prayer was not central. Almost as soon as I could speak, my parents taught me to pray—simple prayers of thanksgiving to God. As a child and later as a parent, mealtime prayers spiced breakfast, lunch and dinner as much as the black pepper and Tabasco sauce I love to pour on food. Most workday mornings for the past 11 years, I’ve “redeemed” the almost-unbearable Dallas morning commute by communing with God. And my favorite moments of our worship service are when the lights dim, heads bow and we spend time in solitude with God.

Still, I’ve got to confess. Prayer is the hardest part of my Christian life. Maybe that’s not true for you. I hope it’s not. But it is for me. A couple of things about prayer prey on my mind, and I doubt I’ll ever reconcile them:

• Sometimes, prayer seems like a dropped call on a cell phone. You know—you’ve been talking and realize nobody’s been on the other end of the line for several minutes. Prayer can be like that. Of course, this says more about me than it does about God. But sometimes, the complete otherness of God is disquieting. I find myself wishing God would speak. Preferably in English, but I’d take Spanish and try to figure out at least a few of the words.

• Intercessory prayer is the hardest. At least it’s hardest to make sense. If God is loving, then why must we beg God to do loving things for hurting people? If God is sovereign, then what difference does prayer make? God’s going to do what God’s going to do. And if God will indeed change God’s mind, then is prayer something like a cosmic referendum, where majority wins or at least a plurality rules? X-number of Christians pray for Mrs. Jones, and she goes into remission. X-minus-1 Christians pray for Mrs. Jones, and she dies. That doesn’t seem very just.

OK, maybe you’ve never struggled with prayers that bounce off the ceiling and back onto your head. And maybe you’ve never stayed awake late, late into the night wondering about the efficacy of baring your soul on behalf of someone you love. Good for you. But in the world where I live, rubber-ball prayers and serious questions about intercession are just part of the messy stuff of faith.

Still, I find myself irresistibly drawn to prayer. I’m compelled by two forces—obedience and need.

First, I pray because Jesus commanded us to pray. He said, “When you pray …,” not, “If you pray ….” We have the Lord’s command and model, so how could we refuse?

Second, and at least as important, I pray because I must. Just as I must talk to Joanna several times a day and I must visit with my young-adult daughters at least every few days, I must talk to God daily. So what if my pleas do not change God’s mind and shape God’s intentions? God loves me more than I love myself and wants to visit with me, to share my life. (Genesis clearly teaches this was God’s intention. Experience clearly confirms this is God’s desire.) The importance of prayer is building and maintaining a relationship with God, not dictating a cosmic wish-list. Prayer has much more to do with discerning God’s will for my life and conforming my will to God’s than bending God to my wishes. And for that matter, the best prayer happens when I am silent before God—listening, even when I cannot “hear.”

Marv Knox is editor of the Baptist Standard.