I recently heard a character on a show explain to the pastor character on the show that "Prayer is just inaction." She was berating him for "praying" when she thought he should have been doing something. Now, obviously, this was a fictional character, but fictional characters come from the minds of real writers, and I've heard too many times (more lately) the same idea. "Our prayers are with them" gets the same basic response: "Prayer is inaction."
Is that true? Well, I'm sure in some cases it is. In John 9 in the story of the blind man healed at the pool of Siloam, the healed man told the Pharisees, "We know that God does not hear sinners; but if anyone is God-fearing and does His will, He hears him" (John 9:31). It was offered as evidence that Jesus feared God and was doing His will. Now, we know that it's not entirely true because if a sinner prays in repentance, he (or she) is heard. But Scripture lists a few ways of insuring we aren't heard, such as asking for the wrong reason (James 4:3) or embracing sin (Psa 66:18; Isa 59:2) or asking without faith (James 1:6-7) and the like, so unbelievers (in particular) who pray under these conditions are making prayer inaction, as it were. But when believers pray, they pray with this in mind: we are commanded to pray (1 Thess 5:17; Eph 6:18; Php 4:6-7; etc.). And we have this confidence: if we ask according to His will, He provides it (1 John 5:14-15).
Since prayer is commanded and answers are promised, quite clearly prayer is not mere inaction. Some may use it as such, but prayer is not, by definition, inaction. The reason skeptics say it is because their premise is that God doesn't answer prayer -- God does not intervene in the affairs of human beings. The accusation, then, is not that prayer is inaction, but that God is inactive. And that's a serious mistake. We know that "The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much" (James 5:16), and "accomplishing much" is not "inaction." Some people use prayer as a "throwing my hands up" approach. "I can't do anything, so I'm giving it over to God." Sometimes that's necessary, but too often it's not. Praying for someone or something does not preclude acting, serving, involving, or, most of all, loving. In fact, if God commands it and promises answers, prayer would logically be the first action taken for other people and events about which we are concerned, but certainly not the only action. Because our God is never inactive, and He always does what's best.
2 comments:
Prayer is inaction only if there is no imminent God. For a Christian, prayer should be the go to in every situation. To me, it seems that when people say they're praying for you, it is because they know of nothing else they can do. But we should be doing both, pray and go do.
As it happens, the power of prayer is very much in my thoughts today (having received an urgent prayer request last evening from a close friend with a family medical emergency).
It strikes me that the unhappy character you mentioned is someone whose faith is primarily in self-help and human effort. Because I firmly believe that God is sovereign over all things and can execute every needful thing without hinderance, accessing His help to work on my behalf is the most essential--and practical--initial action I can take in any situation. I can see how the many references of “our thoughts and our prayers” that we hear (especially in the public arena) are mostly just nice sentiments from people who don’t really know God. I feel sorry for people whose premise it is that God does not intervene in the affairs of human beings; I count 100% on the truth that He does. Personally, I would not wish to live without that hope
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