Prayer is Flesh-Killing Work

Prayer, real mountain moving prayer, is not something that comes naturally. It is certainly not easy. This is evident in request Jesus' disciples made when they asked, "Lord, teach us to pray" (Luke 11:1). If prayer is so easy, then why did the disciples have to ask Jesus to teach them to do it? Take heart, then, if prayer does not come easily for you. It doesn't come naturally as some pretend that it does.

First, the very nature of prayer is pride-killing because it is God dependant. Prayer is the act of asking for something you feel unable to provide for oneself. It follows then that if you are a talented, self-assured, self-confident person, you will not be naturally inclined to pray often or fervently. Pride is the enemy of genuine prayer because pride causes us to under-estimate our need and over-estimate our ability. Is your prayer life sporadic and less-than desperate? It is probably because you are proud.

The second reason that our prayer life is listless is because prayer is not meant to be for our own sake. At first glance, that statement may strike you as completely wrong. After all, if you were convicted in the last paragraph that you were indeed too proud to pray, and you asked God to humble you, is this not for your own benefit? Consider first the words of James, "You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions" (James 4:3). So, if you ask God to cure you of pride so that you might become a person of prayer in order that you may simply soothe your own conscience for being a bad prayer or so that you might consider yourself a better Christian, then you are asking for God to kill pride to build pride. What folly! The purpose of humility is to make us better servants of God and others. We must be a praying people in order that we might be a serving people. We do not become good prayers that we might boast in our praying.

Let me illustrate what I mean. When we read James' warning, we naturally and rightly think that he is speaking of a selfish prayer where someone might simply want a newer car, a better job, or a pretty wife just because he isn't content with the car or job or wife he has. That is an easy selfish prayer to spot. But think of this, when you pray for yourself, do you pray because you are aggravated that you failed your own standard or because you failed God's standard? Are you more upset that you failed yourself or that you failed God? And in your heart, are you hoping that God will make you better so that you will feel better about yourself or because you long to be a self-denying servant like Christ? Are you more concerned with how your failures effect you or others? Examine yourself before the Lord and see if you aren't praying to boost your own self-image instead of the Christ-image in you.

Your prayer ought to be born out of a self-despair but a Godward hope. Ask yourself a few simple questions: Can you convert a single soul? Can you kill a single sin that plagues you? Are you strong enough to beat down your own selfishness? Can you keep your children alive? Can you keep your spouse faithful? Can you pray as you ought? Do you have the strength to love as you should? Can you help your friend in sickness? Can you lend them your might? Can you heal the broken hearted?

We can't do any of those things. Before we can really pray, we need to realize how impotent we truly are.

But then we must ask more questions: Can God convert a single soul? Is He mighty to save or not? Can He destroy the sin that plagues you? Is He strong enough to beat down your selfishness? Can He keep your children alive? Can He keep your spouse faithful? Can He pray for me when I cannot pray as I ought? Does He have the strength to love? Can He help a friend in sickness? Can He lend them His might? Can He heal the broken hearted?

We then, are we not praying? Isn't it because we are altogether selifsh? Prayer is flesh-killing, pride-destroying, Christ-exalting work. Please pray for yourself, friend. Not so that you may boast in how awesome you've become, not that you would ever say that out loud, but so that Christ Himself might shine through you for His glory.

Another Reason to Believe

There are a number of reasons that I find to believe in the veracity of the gospels and the New Testament. One that always sticks out in my mind is the brutal honesty with which the followers of Jesus are depicted, and even the way in which the ministry of Jesus itself is depicted.

The first and most obviously interesting thing about the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, is that they were not written by Jesus. They were written by his immediate disciples. Either Matthew or Mark were written first, depending on who you believe, with John being the latest. Luke composed his gospel account based on eyewitness reporting (Luke 1:1-4). Mark, according to tradition, composed his gospel account under the watchful eye of Peter himself.

Most of the time, when someone writes a book that is a bit of an autobiography, you expect that person to appear in a somewhat favorable light. This is not the case in the gospels. There, we find the disciples being a group of near bunglers. They are constantly misunderstanding Jesus, apparently clueless as to his teaching, and seem to bicker incessantly about who is the best disciple (Matt. 16:10-12; John 12:12-16; Luke 9:46, 22:44). They are not, to say the least, portrayed in a very flattering light.

Imagine if you were Peter, the great leader of the early church, would you be especially keen on including that episode where Jesus called you Satan? (Mark 8:33). Or, would you want to include that part where you denied Jesus three times out of fear being identified with Jesus? (Mark 14:66-72). That took some serious humility to include that, something almost unprecidented in the history of autobiography.

And what are we to make of John's gospel account? By the time John wrote, many of the other disciples were already dead. Yet, he doesn't even name himself in his own book. He only refers to himself as "The One Whom Jesus Loved," which might also be translated, "The One Whom Jesus Kept Loving." What sort of men are these who write about themselves in such a manner?

So imagine these men, these great men, Peter, Matthew, and John. All three of them are followers of Jesus from the beginning. They all had the chance to write down the greatest adventures of their lives, and instead of their books being about them, they chose to write themselves a bit part in order to introduce the world to Jesus. We would not even know of Peter's raising Tabitha from the dead if it weren't for Luke's account in Acts.

I can understand writing a biography about a great man. I can even imagine the disciples wanting to write a great book on the things that Jesus did. I understand seeing greatness and wishing to share that greatness with others. Jesus, since so many books have been written about him, must be great indeed. Yet, here is what I do not so often see. I do not often see a man that is so great that he not only compels men to write books about himself, but that he is so great that he compels men to write truth about themselves. That is the marvelous thing about Jesus, and that is why I believe his disciples. They tell the truth, not only about Jesus, but also about themselves.