30 Days in the Bible, Day 22: Luke 11:1-10

This passage also contains a part of the teaching from the Sermon on the Mount. Here we find a shortened form of the Lord’s Prayer, which suggests that Jesus used this model of prayer on multiple occasions. The general outline is the same, although Luke’s version is shorter. This may be evidence that the Lord’s Prayer was not meant to be the exact wording of a prayer to be repeated by Jesus’ followers (although praying the Lord’s Prayer can be a valuable experience) but a model on which to base our own prayers.

The Bible has a lot to say about prayer. Both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament we find encouragement and teaching on the subject of prayer. Jesus Himself made prayer a significant part of His life, both in content and in time spent in prayer. Note that the Lord’s Prayer is taught along with other teaching about prayer in both Matthew and Luke. We cannot truly serve the Lord if we neglect to pray.

Our emphasis through these 30 days has been on the Word of God. By reading, studying, meditating on, and memorizing Scripture, we hear the Lord speak to us. The Bible is His revealed Word, and as we follow the Holy Spirit’s leading in our time in the Word we canlearn what God has to say to us. The Bible is God’s message to all those who believe in Him, the way He initiates a conversation with us to draw us closer to Him and to our Lord Jesus Christ.

A conversation is a two-way communication. The Lord speaks to us through His Word, and we speak back through prayer. While our study has been focused on God’s side of the conversation, we must never forget our side. As we read and study the Bible, we will find many passages that will help us to pray and encourage us to be faithful in prayer.

It amazes me to think that God wants to hear from me. The God who sent His Son to take my judgment, the Savior who gave Himself for me, the Spirit who guides, convicts and directs my life listen to my prayers, and even more astonishingly answer them. There may be no greater motivation to pray than knowing this is true, and that in prayer we speak directly to God.

As we continue our journey in the Word, and as we continue to see how we can more effectively learn about what God has revealed to us, let’s not forget to answer back. Listen to what the Lord has to say, then let Him know what you are learning. By engaging in this divine conversation, we will find ourselves drawing closer to our Lord, and becoming more like Him.

God-sized prayers

Our church began a 30 day prayer emphasis this morning. My pastor preached on the subject, challenging us as individual Christians, families, and as a church to renew and deepen our prayer lives for the next 30 days.

He encouraged us to pray "God-sized prayers." I think this point is well-taken in our culture. We often pray little prayers: help in some circumstance of life, meeting a specific need, changing some small aspect of our character, or divine intervention in some immediate crisis. There is absolutely nothing wrong with any of these prayers; we are encouraged in Scripture to bring everything before our Father in prayer. The problem is when that is all we pray about.

I freely admit to struggling with prayer. I am an "ADD pray-er" (probably because I am ADD). I admire, even envy, great prayer warriors like Martin Luther or George Muller. Yet, despite my best efforts, I cannot focus on a single prayer session for long. My mind wanders as various subjects flit through it, brought in sometimes by the very prayers I am praying. I have to conclude my prayers, get up, and come back later to regain that focus. And we all know what can happen when we walk away from a time with the Lord.

With someone like me, the urgent often crowds out the important. I pray for what is immediately on my mind, or for needs that are brought to my attention, but leave out the "routine" prayers for ongoing situations in our world. Maybe you are like that, too. How do we remain focused long enough on what is so critically important in our world when so much draws our attention away?

This is where "God-sized prayers" come in. When I sit down to pray, I want to pray in a way that shows I believe that God is an awesomely powerful God who cares about our world and about me, and who wants to answer prayer to show His power and His love. I want to pray not for what seems to be a manageable task for God, but for what seems from my human perspective to be impossible except for God. I want prayers that stretch the boundaries of faith.

This isn't to say I want to challenge God, to test Him and see if He's up to the challenge. No, I want to challenge myself, and see if I can at least have faith enough to believe God can do amazing things in our world today. Prayer doesn't stretch God, but it does stretch me. I believe one reason so many Christians struggle with faith is that we don't exercise it much. We say we believe in a powerful and loving God who cares about us and our world, but we pray like God is inconvenienced by listening to us and only answers prayers grudgingly. Worse, sometimes we pray like we believe God can't do what we ask.

We don't want to be presumptuous. One of the flaws in the theology of those who preach a prosperity gospel is the teaching that God must give us what we ask for, no matter what it is or what His will for our life is. Jesus reminds us to pray for the Father's will to be done in the Lord's Prayer, and we need to remember that when we pray. Prayer is not a demand session to get what we want, but a communication with our Heavenly Father. We do occasionally pray for things that would not bring Him glory, or even for things that would be destructive to us. Since He is our Father, He knows what we need, and what is best.

With that in mind, though, let's make our prayers bigger. I challenge you to use prayer to stretch yourself. What's a big need in your life? What's a big need in our world? What can't change unless God intervenes? Let those be your prayers. As you you pray, watch, and wait, you will see many prayers answered, but you will also see yourself stretching your faith and growing stronger in your confidence in the Lord.

Doing what Jesus does

One of the inscriptions you can find on Christian items is the acronym "WWJD?" This, of course, is short for "What would Jesus do?" This question was posed in Charles Sheldon's novel In His Steps many years ago. While it has become a bit of cliche, it really isn't a bad question to ask. The point made in the book is that you aren't asking what Jesus would do if He were here on earth today, but what would He do if He were in your situation.

However, there is one example in the Bible of something we can do that is what Jesus is doing now. We studied 1 Timothy 2:1-5 this past Wednesday at our church, and I was struck by the juxtaposition of Paul's urging that Christians should intercede for others with the description of Jesus in verse 5 as the "one mediator between God and man." In several NT passages, Jesus is said to be interceding for us before His Father. He is a "go-between" on our behalf, as the One who paid the price that gave us access to the Father's throne.

In a more limited sense, we are told in this passage to be a "go-between" for others in prayer. We obviously are not the ones who provide the answers for those prayers (although God may use us as His agents to affect those answers!), but we do have a responsibility to pray for others. Whether it is those in authority, those who need to know Jesus Christ, or those who are suffering, we have the remarkable privilege of sharing in a very small part of the ministry of intercession practiced by Jesus.

Today maybe we need to ask ourselves not "What would Jesus do?" but "What is Jesus doing?" Then we can let that thought spur us on to engaging in prayer for those who need our intercession, and learn to appreciate what our Lord is doing for us.

Sunday sermon: "The First Response"

In Nehemiah 1:11, Nehemiah almost casually mentions that he was the "cupbearer to the king." Often our picture of a cupbearer is one of a lowly servant, forced into a job that could cost him his life, probably someone who was expendable to the court. A Persian cupbearer was anything but that. Nehemiah had to be an accomplished, talented, and highly trusted man to be made the cupbearer. In addition to literally having the king's life in his hands, he would also have been an advisor, part of the king's council. From a human standpoint, Nehemiah was everything our society admires: powerful, skilled, well-placed, and (as the rest of the book implies) wealthy.

Yet when faced with the shocking news from Judah that the walls were fallen and in disrepair, Nehemiah's first response was not to see what he could do about it. The news, which probably reflected a relatively recent event, struck Nehemiah deeply. He broke down and mourned for at least three months. During that time, he took what he felt was the most important step he could: he went to God in prayer.

This is the opposite of what we often do when faced with a problem. We do everything we can do, use all of our talent and skill, then, if we can't solve it, turn to prayer. Nehemiah realized that anything he could do would be meaningless if it was not first of all God's will.

Nehemiah's prayer is instructive in another way. As he faces a serious problem, we expect that his first cry would be for help from the Lord. Instead, he begins by exalting God. This is a significant emphasis; if Nehemiah is going to ask the Lord for His help, he recognizes that he needs to be asking a God who is capable of helping, one more powerful than Nehemiah, King Artaxerxes, or the opposition back in Palestine. God is greater than all, "awe-inspiring," and thus a worthy God to be petitioned.

Even then, Nehemiah doesn't jump right into his request. He laments and confesses the sin of himself and his people before God. Again this is a recognition of who God is by Nehemiah that leads toward his request. The reason that Judah is in crisis is their own sin. Nehemiah, though living in Persia and not of the generation that went into exile, includes himself in this confession of failure to keep God's covenant. He understands who he is in light of the greatness of God, and will not request God's help until he is sure that his relationship with the Lord is unhindered.

Finally Nehemiah prays for favor from God. Even now he does not ask for a great miracle to be done, but for favor in the eyes of the king. Nehemiah reaches the place where he can, after months of prayer, offer himself as part of the solution to the problem, under God's providential care. 

As we face the challenges and problems of our lives, what is our first response? If we have not yet learned that it is prayer, then we need to learn from what Nehemiah teaches us. I confess to often failing in this regard, and I know that I need to glorify God, confess my sin, build my relationship with Jesus, and then seek the Lord's will and His power to overcome the issues of life. If we all learn to do this, how much more can we accomplish for the kingdom of God by the grace of God?

Sunday sermon: "Jesus Meets Persistent Pleaders"

Putting the two pericopes (a fancy scholarly term for "paragraph" or "short literary section") from Matthew 20:20-34 in context highlights the contrast between two similar events. In each section, two men are asking Jesus for something. (James and John try to sneak their request through their mother, who some scholars think may have been Jesus' aunt, but Jesus sees through that.)  In each Jesus asks "What do you want?" And, despite what some people have written, both were answered.

The major difference between the two requests was not in their content, but in their motivation. James and John (and possibly their mother) were motivated by pride. They wanted the chief positions of honor in the kingdom. Perhaps they legitimately thought they had earned those positions, as two of Jesus' closest confidants (as well as possibly His cousins). They may also have just been trying to preempt the other disciples by getting their request in first. In either case, their was a lot of self at the center of their request.

That really isn't much different than what we see in a lot of what passes for "Christian" teaching today. A whole group of "health and wealth" preachers teach that you should ask for what you want, and expect God to give it to you. Some even say that if you ask the right way, God must give you what you ask for. This places the emphasis in prayer on the petitioner, who puts him- or herself at the center of the universe. Prayers like this are made by people who essentially think of themselves as God. the one in control.

Jesus first challenges James and John with the price they would have to pay: the same kind of suffering He was facing Himself. Their glib "Yes, we can!" response was met with the assurance that they would indeed pay a great price. Still, Jesus told them "no." He would not give them the position they sought, because it was not His to give, but was already prepared by the Father for those whose it was.

The rest of the disciples, scarcely less ambitious, were angry with the two, and Jesus rebuked them as well. The key to greatness in His kingdom is not position, but service. The greatest is the one who serves the most; first place goes to the lowliest. How would this attitude taking root in our churches today change the dynamics of our congregations? What would it mean if we chose leaders on the basis of who served the most rather than who jockeyed for power best?

The two men in the other pericope stand in contrast to the disciples. They certainly want their request heard, and they call out persistently for Jesus. Their cry shows their heart: "Lord, have mercy on us, Son of David!" They acknowledge who Jesus is, as Lord and as Messiah, and they ask for mercy, not for something they think they deserve. They believed Jesus could help them, so they cried out for Him.

Jesus answers them with a "yes." In their case, He heals their blind eyes, and in response they follow Him. This apparently means they took to the road to Jerusalem with Jesus' band of pilgrims. Perhaps they were there for the eventful week that led to the death and resurrection of Jesus. In any case, their response to Jesus' mercy was to give Him themselves.

What is our attitude in prayer? Do we pray like we expect God to recognize our worthiness to receive anything we want? Or do we humbly ask our Lord to show us His mercy? Do we respond to the mercy and generosity of God by asking for even more, or by giving Him all we are? We can't buy God's grace; we can't match the price He paid. All we can do is give Him what we have, in humble service and gratitude for all we have received by His grace.

Big and Small Prayers

It is always interesting to argue with an ancient author. While it may seem that the advantage lies with the reader, who is after all alive while the author is not and can thus not respond, the very fact that the author's work has survived gives immense weight to his argument. I certainly do not consider myself to be the intellectual equal of a classic author, yet I have confidence that sometimes I am right and he is wrong.

Origen seems to be all over the place when it comes to the kinds of prayer we are to make. He emphasizes that we are to ask God for the big things, which in his estimation are those that are spiritual, and not worry God with the small things, which he considers most physical requests to be.  He then discusses how when we ask for an receive the more important things we will also receive the lesser. There seems to be a tension within Origen as to how we approach God without being focused on our worldly needs.

Origen disparages the physical, preferring the spiritual. In order to fit requests like "Give us today our needful bread" into what he sees as a spiritual context, he takes allegorical liberties in his interpretation. In doing so, he often teaches a significant spiritual truth, but he also misses the main point. (Eventually, this allergorical interpretation and focus on the spiritual while downplaying the physical would get him into trouble!)

However, I think there is an important point made by Origen's teaching on prayer. I don't believe we have to find a "spiritual meaning" behind every request or teaching on prayer in the Bible; it is clear that we are to pray for everything. Where Origen has it right is that we should not allow a focus on our temporal needs to completely over shadow the spiritual needs in our lives. We should pray for our daily bread, healing, and other earthly concerns, but we should also be praying "Your kingdom come" and "Deliver us from the evil one."

If we balanced our prayer perspectives, we wouldn't fall into the "health and wealth gospel" trap of seeing God as there to provide everything we want. Prayer is not only about us and our needs; it is about God and our relationship with Him. As a loving Father, He wants to meet our needs (although there is no Biblical warrant for asking Him to meet our "wants"), but He also wants us to draw closer in a loving relationship that will last for eternity.

So while I think Origen has gone too far in his quest to make prayer purely about spiritual concerns, I think there is a salutary warning for us not to go the other way and make our prayers purely about our temporal concerns.  

Origen: On Prayer

One element of my Lenten observance is reading teaching about prayer. I plan to combine this to a large degree with my interest in patristics, and to read from some of the many writings of the church fathers on prayer.

I came across Origen's treatise "On Prayer" as I looked up some materials online. (Many sites have the public domain translation of William Curtis available free of charge.) Origen is a truly interesting figure in the early church, whose reputation throughout the years (even going back to his own times) has swung back and forth depending on the controversies of the era, but he is generally regarded as the greatest scholar of his time and one of the greatest in church history, even by those who find problems with his exegetical methods or theological views. We have quite a bit of his work still available, yet it is just a small sample of his massive output.

This treatise is a short one, addressed to two Christians, Ambrosius and Tatiana, and is exactly what its title suggests: a discussion of prayer. One aspect of Origen's work I appreciate is his attempt to ground all of his teaching in Scripture. I found myself pausing to meditate over the beginning passages of this work, where Origen speaks of the "impossibility" of praying in the right way, which is only made possible through the Holy Spirit.

His comments on the disciples asking Jesus to teach them to pray are powerful: "I think it must have been the awakened consciousness of human weakness falling short of prayer in the right way, above all realized as he listened to great words of intimate knowledge falling from the Savior's lips in prayer to the Father, that moved one of the disciples of Jesus to say to the Lord when He ceased praying, 'Lord, teach us to pray, even as John also taught his disciples.'" The example of Jesus as recorded in the Gospels (not to mention the unwritten example He set for His disciples) showed them and us that our prayers are not a matter of a particular set of words or a set pattern, but of understanding that we need help to pray.


This is a truth I wrestle with. There is a tendency to think that "learning to pray" means finding the right prayer outline (ACTS, the Model Prayer, etc.) and using that for every prayer. We try to find appropriate language; should it be formal or informal, written or spontaneous? In the end, Origen reminds us that in a sense none of those elements matters. We can't pray right.


Of course, he continues with the wonderful Biblical truth that the Holy Spirit prays with us and for us. We are empowered to pray by God the Spirit, and He guides us and teaches us as we pray. This to me is a critical lesson that I am still trying to grasp. It is in knowing our powerlessness that we become powerful; it is in understanding that we don't know how to pray that we are able to pray.


I hope to finish this treatise this weekend, and I hope to learn lessons that I can use to strengthen my own prayer time.