What does prayer do? Why do we pray?
As most of you know, I have made it a pass time, wrestling with, deconstructing, reconstructing, and pondering aspects of faith. Right now, I am stuck on prayer and God's leadership.
I have to wonder, why it is we pray for things or things to happen. Does it really make a difference? Would the things that happen to us, for us, with us, against us, happen whether or not we pray for them. I used to fully believe that prayer changed the universe. I used to think that the things that happened, when I prayed for them, happened because I prayed for them. When they didn't happen, I just figured it was God's "no." When bad stuff happened, I figured it was God trying to grow me. I could live with that. But, the more I have stepped out of my religious bubble (faith is easy in isolation), I recognized that the same good stuff and bad crap that happened to me, to which I blamed God or "gave him the glory," happens to everybody else whether they pray or not.
The fact is, the people who are actively working and take risks are the ones who get rewarded and the ones who sit around and play the victim do not (If anyone takes issue with this statement, it is somewhat biblical to say this, depending on what your favorite verses are). We can even see this played out in religious circles. The results of leadership are a direct impact of the leaders vision and personality. Mega Churches have Mega Leaders and often have a good location on the interstate that was the result of some "lets go and conquer the land" campaign. On the other hand, the pastors who are not as energetic and dynamic and active do not see the same numbers. In a lot of cases, the pastors think the other is not following God because if they were, how could their church be like _________. I am not placing judgment on either one. I am just saying that this is the way it is.
As a matter of fact, these two hypothetical pastors can pray about the same things and end up with different answers. Not just pastors, but any two people can pray about the same stuff and end up with two diametrically opposed answers in many arenas, from abortion to marriage. Is God answering their prayers or is the answer a result of the desire of their heart as well as their presupposition about who God is?
A person who believes God wants them to be rich will take every opportunity to be rich. A person who does not believe that won't. Is this evidence of God's leadership or the culture in which they were raised?
I remember believing many things about people and opportunities in my life that I was sure would happen because it was God's will and it didn't. I also know people may have believed with all their heart things about me that were God's will that didn't happen. Anyone who has been around church a while has had someone tell them that God wants them to do something while thinking "God didn't tell me to do that."
Does God really answer prayer or lead us in a supernatural way or do we just fit the outcome or our choice into our faith paradigm? Right now, I am leaning toward the latter. People do what they want to do and believe they are supposed to do at certain turning points in their own life to meet their present need or desire and God gets the blame for it.
Many people (I have certainly been guilty) who go around saying that God led them to do this or that are often avoiding responsibility for themselves when they should be saying, "I want to tell you..." without using God as a prop. Is it necessarily less godly to do this? I think it could be more evident of God's power when we can change from a passive weakling (which I still am sometimes) to being able to stand on our own two feet and articulate the desires of our hearts and our feelings and then put them into action. It is being a good steward of our life and talent when we can do that.
While thus far I have focussed on the outcome of prayer, I also ponder the act of prayer. I often hear people say that prayer does not change God, but changes us. Maybe the outcome is different because our attitude is different.
When we talk to God, it can have a cathartic effect. It can allow us to vent. But, of course I still think the outcome of such discussions depends on our view of God rather than the reality of who God is. I know in my life and many others, I prayed tirelessly about some things and really did not see many breakthroughs. I finally saw change and progress after I jumped into a more psychological arena such as counseling and Adult Children of Alcoholic meetings for a while and finally understood why I was the way I was (depressed) and ways to talk myself out of it. I still have more progress to make, but stepping away from the "spiritual" as I understood it and finding these other things was like a weight lifted off of my shoulders. It was as if the answers were all around me and I was too busy looking up to see them.
When we talk to God in a group, others can be edified and encouraged (not that we do it to show off, but we all can admit it feels good to hear someone pray for us... c'mon be honest).
While all things are supernatural by default, because God created all things, is the impact of the act of prayer more of a psychological phenomenon than one that is specifically supernatural as a result of doing it?
Hmm... think about it for a while and then wrestle with me.
Have a great weekend.
