Musings about Prayer: Part 1

Years ago I read a fiction story which contained a line about prayer I've remembered for decades. The characters discuss why some prayer is answered and other prayer is not. They consider that is could be due to the fickleness of God or to the manner of the pray-er's asking. None of the explanations satisfy, though.

Finally, as one character departs, he says simply, "Why God chooses to answer some prayers and not others, I do not know. All I know for certain is that it's always right to ask."

That line stayed with me. "It's always right to ask." For years that has been my prayer-baseline. It's always right to ask. Even when my asking is petty and immature, I can still ask.

Western expressions of Christianity, however, have made prayer all about asking. Books, conferences, and workshops focus on the proper way to ask. It's as if I could learn some code for asking that would force God to answer the way I want to be answered.

If I use certain words in asking and a particular inflection of voice, my prayer will be answered . . . no, God will have no choice but to answer the prayer. It's a heady thing to feel like I can control God by using the right words and mannerisms. I don't necessarily feel that I'm manipulated God, but that is what I'm doing. So I not only ask, but I ask in a particular way.

And I ask for particular things. I pray for health and job and house. I pray for what I want in the lives of people around me. It's always right to ask, remember? Sometimes, though, my asking seems to be very much focused on myself and on what I would like to see happen in my life and the lives of those around me. And I realize that my sight is not 20/20. More than a little self-centeredness creeps in.

I've prayed that way for a long time. I've taught that way of prayer. It has held an important place in my journey with God.

I think I've stalled out in that prayer.