Wednesday, 02 July 2008

• Living Prayer in Word and Action

  In response to the the revelife crew's  Question of the Day: Telling Non-Christians You'll Pray For Them - Awkward? Do you tell non-Christians that you'll pray for them, even when they don't ask for it? If you're a non-Christian, how do you feel when someone says that you're in their prayers?

  Our true convictions reveal themselves in our words and actions. 
  
  I believe that Jesus is who He said He was ~
  The Son of God, existent with the Father and Holy Spirit at the foundation of the earth, eternally foredestined by the infinitude of His love to embody the Almighty's unitary attributes of justice, mercy, grace, wisdom, and on and on in descriptions of omnipotent perfection, the culmination of which He demonstrated in his once and for all act of sacrificial love ~ HIS love so mighty and pure that HE from the beginning of time was willing to die for HIS beloved creation.
  He purposed to come and die for you and me to show us WHO HE IS, that we might finally have a place to rest our broken hopes: in HIS greatness, in HIS mercy, in HIS awesome, cherishing, tenderness, in HIS willingness to absorb all of my brokenness into HIS perfection.
  
  Knowing this, my prayers are my heart and soul's communication with my Creator, as inseparable from me as my life itself - meaning, present in this body as long as I am present, and as soon as I am absent from this body, I will be present with Him.  My communion with Him is part of me, His gift to me; and HIS redeeming work in me becomes more and more evident as I believe in His transforming work.  I am not a Christian because I have put that title on my desktop plaque and continued on in life’s journey unaffected.  I am a Christian because He came to me in my utterly confounded state of weakness and defeat, He made me aware of WHO HE IS, and HE awakened a new life in me.
  
  This is who I am because HE gave HIS life to me – He bestowed His life to live inside of me today, to defeat sin in me that I may experience every day in Him, His power, His victory.  I do not pray merely because it will make other people feel good, and I do not pray believing that I may have some influence over God with my sincerity or strength or will.  I pray in communion with, in response to, the movement of His Holy Spirit and power inside me.  I pray for the lost because HE is moved to compassion for those hurt, weary, meek and poor.  I pray because this is who I am in Him, and it is HIS power to affect change, healing, mercy, or compassion that I believe in. 
  
  My outward action is a reflection of the inward man (woman, in my case) ~ I live because Christ lives in me ~ I pray because He moves me to ~ and if that does make others feel awkward, it is not my concern ~ though I certainly do understand the validity of their response, my focus is not on them, but on the Lord, on His power, on His magnitude.  Before I understood, I too, experienced awkwardness at others’ suggestions of prayer, because I didn’t understand the true power to salvation in Christ Jesus, but had that kept others from praying, I would not have seen for myself.  I expect that as I am a Christian, I will act in accordance with my convictions and pray to my Savior for the help of others. 
  
  I cannot offer up my prayers to others and act like I am gracing them with MY kind wishes.  Who am I?  My best is but filthy rags.  Every good and perfect gift comes from Him. 
  
  Others desire, and in fact have a right to expect, that someone claiming to be a Christian will in all earnestness, be praying to the One True God, the definitive ultimate power of the Universe.  They are watching to see what will happen.  The awkwardness is a result of one belief-system coming in full contact with another’s, and the explosion of real questions that ensues from that ideological confrontation.  “So, what does that mean?”  “Who are you praying to?”  “What will/could that possibly do?”  “Who is God, anyways?’ ...and on down the line of theological query. And perhaps that awkwardness may be the unaccustomed’s response of “okay, you got my attention, so what happens next?”  Whatever the case, these interactions are the true litmus test of your own convictions – do you really believe what you say, or is it just another catch phrase?  Is there power behind your prayer?  Where do your prayers go, and will it mean anything to the person you’re talking to?  Will it change their life?  If so, how?
  
  We are tired of weak, meager, disappointing remarks of “I’m praying for you” that are effectually powerless, helpless gestures that really mean “I’d help you if I knew how, but I don’t have the answers for that in my own life, so I’m leaving you and your problem up to God because perhaps He can help you…”  Offering a prayer as a means of shirking the true, brotherly work of coming alongside a neighbor – devoting your time and your LIFE to help each other walk through issues in truth, righteousness, and love – is a cheap disguise for a cold, too-busy-to-bother-with-your-heart’s-perplexity, write-off attitude that by all rights disheartens, disbenefits, and imparts rightful awkwardness to the hearer.  If this is the case, by all means do not say the words.  Better to be silent than to speak in insincerity.  But best of all is to allow the power of Christ to consume you, become immersed in His saving strength, seek Him until His face is all you see, and then His life inside of you will shine grace upon that one you are praying for, awkward or not.
  
  And ultimately, whether we tell someone that we’re praying for them or not does not affect His power in any of our lives.  Allow the true power of the Lord to come in and administer to the other’s awkwardness.  He is real, as you place your full assurance in Him, you don’t have to worry about others’ responses ~ their hearts are His to overwhelm with Love – and He WILL – when they choose to open the door to let Him in.  J

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