Rules for prayer

Google Reader recommended to me a blog called The Resurgence. In their words: “The Resurgence is a movement that resources multiple generations to live for Jesus so that they can effectively reach their cities with the Gospel by staying culturally accessible and Biblically faithful.” Hmm, interesting choice, Google. But you’re right, I would certainly find this informative and worthwhile reading.

Sadly, but I think understandably, The Resurgence does not have any mechanism for leaving comments on their posts. I have a lot of questions I’d love to discuss with the post authors. There is a feedback form, and I sent in a message that way inquiring about how best to ask questions on specific post content. (I sent it anonymously, even though it asks for first and last name, so who knows if they will deem my message worth replying to.) In the meantime, I’m curious if anyone out in reader-land might have an answer for these questions that really stick out in my mind.

In a recent post about intercessory prayer, Pastor Winfield Bevins writes,

There are five major areas of intercession that we should pray for in our daily prayer life. Each one represents a circle of influence and authority that God gives us to pray for. When praying we should start with the first area and then work our way down to the last.

The circles listed below are family and friends, church, city, nation, and world. All of those are ostensibly things “that God gives us,” provided you believe in a God who gives us things. On my first reading of this paragraph, though, I thought that Pastor Bevins was saying that God in some way delineated these circles, these divisions. Are the five circles just a helpful mnemonic, so that everyone worth praying for gets covered, or is there some basis for choosing these particular five, scriptural or otherwise?

Also, it feels to me like there is a high degree of “should” in this short passage. What happens if one doesn’t pray for each of the five areas, or doesn’t pray for them on a daily basis? What happens if one starts with the last area and ends with the first, or jumbles up the order entirely? What is the basis for knowing that these are the ways one “should” pray? I know not everyone who prays believes that there are strict how-to rules, but I’m curious, in the case of those who do, what the supposed consequences of failing to follow them are. Does your prayer just not get heard? (Like calling a fax machine line from your telephone?) Or does God actually get upset at you for not following protocol?

On “Our World,” the final item in this list, Pastor Bevins writes,

Lastly, we should pray for the people and governments of the world. Although you may never leave your country, you can still have an influence in the lives of others across the world by praying for them. Remember, it is God’s desire to save the elect. Ask the Lord to speak to you about a certain country that you should pray for. God promises to listen when we pray.

Okay, tell me if I have this straight. God wants to save people. If you ask God to tell you who to pray for, and then pray for them, God will “listen” and, it is implied, actually help those people. Why doesn’t God just help those people in the first place? Why does he have to wait for some random person to pray the prayer he told them to pray?

Also, there’s this whole issue of “God’s desire to save the elect.” The elect basically means “the chosen people.” This sounds to me like a way to weasel out of any apparent failures of prayer. (As in: You prayed for the people of such-and-such country and then they had a bloody civil war and/or their cities were destroyed by earthquakes and/or everybody died of cholera? Well, I guess they weren’t the elect!) And aren’t the elect already, you know, elected? Why is it necessary to pray for people if they’ve already been chosen as part of the group God desires to save?

I realize that many of my readers don’t share Pastor Bevins’ perspective, and may not be able to clarify his meaning. I am genuinely curious, though. What is the thought process behind this understanding of prayer?

January 8, 2010 · Written by
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