Search
Prayer (by Wayne Grudem)
{{Template:Byline|firstName = Wayne|lastName = Grudem}}
Scholar's Article by Wayne Grudem (may not be edited).
Chapter 18 from Systematic Theology. An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (Zondervan, 1994)
"Prayer. Why does God want us to pray? How can we pray effectively?"
Used with permission. Copyright 1994 Wayne Grudem. All Rights Reserved.
EXPLANATION AND SCRIPTURAL BASIS
The character of God and his relationship to the world, as discussed in the previous chapters, lead naturally to a consideration of the doctrine of prayer. Prayer may be defined as follows: Prayer is personal communication with God.
This definition is very broad. What we call “prayer” includes prayers of request for ourselves or for others (sometimes called prayers of petition or intercession), confession of sin, adoration, praise and thanksgiving, and also God communicating to us indications of his response.
Why Does God Want Us to Pray?
Prayer is not made so that God can find out what we need, because Jesus tells us, “Your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (
The first words of the Lord’s Prayer, “Our Father who art in heaven” (
But God does not only want us to trust him. He also wants us to love him and have fellowship with him. This, then, is a second reason why God wants us to pray: Prayer brings us into deeper fellowship with God, and he loves us and delights in our fellowship with him.
A third reason God wants us to pray is that in prayer God allows us as creatures to be involved in activities that are eternally important. When we pray, the work of the kingdom is advanced. In this way, prayer gives us opportunity to be involved in a significant way in the work of the kingdom and thus gives expression to our greatness as creatures made in God’s image.
The Effectiveness of Prayer
How exactly does prayer work? Does prayer not only do us good but also affect God and the world?
Prayer Changes the Way God Acts.
James tells us, “You do not have, because you do not ask” (
If we were really convinced that prayer changes the way God acts, and that God does bring about remarkable changes in the world in response to prayer, as Scripture repeatedly teaches that he does, then we would pray much more than we do. If we pray little, it is probably because we do not really believe that prayer accomplishes much at all.
Effective Prayer Is Made Possible by Our Mediator, Jesus Christ.
Because we are sinful and God is holy, we have no right on our own to enter into his presence. We need a mediator to come between us and God and to bring us into God’s presence. Scripture clearly teaches, “There is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” (
But if Jesus is the only mediator between God and man, will God hear the prayers of those who do not trust in Jesus? The answer depends on what we mean by “hear.” Since God is omniscient, he always “hears” in the sense that he is aware of the prayers made by unbelievers who do not come to him through Christ. God may even, from time to time, answer their prayers out of his mercy and in a desire to bring them to salvation through Christ. However, God has nowhere promised to respond to the prayers of unbelievers. The only prayers that he has promised to “hear” in the sense of listening with a sympathetic ear and undertaking to answer when they are made according to his will, are the prayers of Christians offered through the one mediator, Jesus Christ (cf.
Then what about believers in the Old Testament? How could they come to God through Jesus the mediator? The answer is that the work of Jesus as our mediator was foreshadowed by the sacrificial system and the offerings made by the priests in the temple (
Jesus’ activity as a mediator is especially seen in his work as a priest: he is our “great high priest who has passed through the heavens,” one who “in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin” (
As recipients of the new covenant, we do not need to stay “outside the temple,” as all believers except the priests were required to do under the old covenant. Nor do we need to stay outside of the “Holy of Holies” (
We do not just come into God’s presence as strangers, or as visitors, or as laypersons, but as priests—as people who belong in the temple and have a right and even a duty to be in the most sacred places in the temple. Using imagery from the ceremony for ordination of priests (see
What Is Praying “in Jesus’ Name”?
Jesus says, “Whatever you ask in my name I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son; if you ask anything in my name, I will do it” (
To come in the name of someone means that another person has authorized us to come on his authority, not on our own. When Peter commands the lame man, “in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk” (
In a broader sense the “name” of a person in the ancient world represented the person himself and therefore all of his character. To have a “good name” (
Does this mean that it is wrong to add “in Jesus’ name” to the end of our prayers? It is certainly not wrong, as long as we understand what is meant by it, and that it is not necessary to do so. There may be some danger, however, if we add this phrase to every public or private prayer we make, for very soon it will become to people simply a formula to which they attach very little meaning and say without thinking about it. It may even begin to be viewed, at least by younger believers, as a sort of magic formula that makes prayer more effective. To prevent such misunderstanding, it would probably be wise to decide not to use the formula frequently and to express the same thought in other words, or simply in the overall attitude and approach we take toward prayer. For example, prayers could begin, “Father, we come to you in the authority of our Lord Jesus, your Son...” or, “Father, we do not come on our own merits but on the merits of Jesus Christ, who has invited us to come before you...” or, “Father, we thank you for forgiving our sins and giving us access to your throne by the work of Jesus your Son....” At other times even these formal acknowledgments should not be thought necessary, so long as our hearts continually realize that it is our Savior who enables us to pray to the Father at all. Genuine prayer is conversation with a Person whom we know well, and who knows us. Such genuine conversation between persons who know each other never depends on the use of certain formulas or required words, but is a matter of sincerity in our speech and in our heart, a matter of right attitudes, and a matter of the condition of our spirit.
Should We Pray to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit?
A survey of the prayers of the New Testament indicates that they are usually addressed neither to God the Son nor to the Holy Spirit, but to God the Father. Yet a mere count of such prayers may be misleading, for the majority of the prayers we have recorded in the New Testament are those of Jesus himself, who constantly prayed to God the Father, but of course did not pray to himself as God the Son. Moreover, in the Old Testament, the trinitarian nature of God was not so clearly revealed, and it is not surprising that we do not find much evidence of prayer addressed directly to God the Son or God the Holy Spirit before the time of Christ.
Moreover, the fact that Jesus is “a merciful and faithful high priest” (
There is therefore clear enough scriptural warrant to encourage us to pray not only to God the Father (which seems to be the primary pattern, and certainly follows the example that Jesus taught us in the Lord’s Prayer), but also to pray directly to God the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Both are correct, and we may pray either to the Father or to the Son.
But should we pray to the Holy Spirit? Though no prayers directly addressed to the Holy Spirit are recorded in the New Testament, there is nothing that would forbid such prayer, for the Holy Spirit, like the Father and the Son, is fully God and is worthy of prayer and is powerful to answer our prayers. (Note also Ezekiel’s invitation to the “breath” or “spirit” in
The Role of the Holy Spirit in Our Praying.
In
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. And he who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
Some Important Considerations in Effective Prayer
Scripture indicates a number of considerations that need to be taken into account if we would offer the kind of prayer that God desires from us.
Praying According to God’s Will.
John tells us, “This is the confidence which we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have obtained the requests made of him” (
But how do we know what God’s will is when we pray? If the matter we are praying about is covered in a passage of Scripture in which God gives us a command or a direct declaration of his will, then the answer to this question is easy: His will is that his Word be obeyed and that his commands be kept. We are to seek for perfect obedience to God’s moral will on earth so that God’s will may be done “on earth as it is in heaven” (
This means, for example, that if we are seeking wisdom in the making of an important decision, we do not have to wonder whether it is God’s will that we receive wisdom to act rightly. Scripture has already settled that question for us, because there is a promise of Scripture that applies:
If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives to all men generously and without reproaching, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways, will receive anything from the Lord. (
James 1:5-8 )
We should have great confidence that God will answer our prayer when we ask him for something that accords with a specific promise or command of Scripture like this. In such cases, we know what God’s will is, because he has told us, and we simply need to pray believing that he will answer.
However, there are many other situations in life where we do not know what God’s will is. We may not be sure, because no promise or command of Scripture applies, whether it is God’s will that we get the job we have applied for, or win an athletic contest in which we are participating (a common prayer among children, especially), or be chosen to hold office in the church, and so on. In all of these cases, we should bring to bear as much of Scripture as we understand, perhaps to give us some general principles within which our prayer can be made. But beyond this, we often must admit that we simply do not know what God’s will is. In such cases, we should ask him for deeper understanding and then pray for what seems best to us, giving reasons to the Lord why, in our present understanding of the situation, what we are praying for seems to be best. But it is always right to add, either explicitly or at least in the attitude of our heart, “Nevertheless, if I am wrong in asking this, and if this is not pleasing to you, then do as seems best in your sight,” or, more simply, “If it is your will.” Sometimes God will grant what we have asked. Sometimes he will give us deeper understanding or change our hearts so that we are led to ask something differently. Sometimes he will not grant our request at all but will simply indicate to us that we must submit to his will (see
Some Christians object that to add the phrase “if it is your will” to our prayers “destroys our faith.” What it actually does is express uncertainty about whether what we pray for is God’s will or not. And it is appropriate when we do not really know what God’s will is. But at other times this would not be appropriate: to ask God to give us wisdom to make a decision and then say, “If it is your will to give me wisdom here” would be inappropriate, for it would be saying that we do not believe God meant what he said in
Even when a command or promise of Scripture applies, there may be nuances of application that we do not at first fully understand. Therefore it is important in our prayer that we not only talk to God but also listen to him. We should frequently bring a request to God and then wait silently before him. In those times of waiting on the Lord (
Praying with Faith.
Jesus says, “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours” (
In fact,
Several other passages encourage us to exercise faith when we pray. “Whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith,” Jesus teaches his disciples (
Obedience.
Since prayer is a relationship with God as a person, anything in our lives that displeases him will be a hindrance to prayer. The psalmist says, “If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened” (
The apostle Peter quotes
Now this teaching must not be misunderstood. We do not need to be freed from sin completely before God can be expected to answer our prayers. If God only answered the prayers of sinless people, then no one in the whole Bible except Jesus would have had his or her prayers answered. When we come before God through his grace, we come cleansed by the blood of Christ (
Confession of Sins.
Because our obedience to God is never perfect in this life, we continually depend on his forgiveness for our sins. Confession of sins is necessary in order for God to “forgive us” in the sense of restoring his day-by-day relationship with us (see
Sometimes confessing our sins to other trusted Christians will bring an assurance of forgiveness and encouragement to overcome sin as well. James relates mutual confession to prayer, for in a passage discussing powerful prayer, James encourages us, “Therefore confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed” (
Forgiving Others.
Jesus says, “If you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father also will forgive you; but if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (
Since prayer presumes a relationship with God as a person, this is not surprising. If we have sinned against him and grieved the Holy Spirit (cf.
Humility.
James tells us that “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (
Jesus’ parable about the Pharisee and the tax collector illustrates this. When the Pharisee stood to pray, he was boastful: “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, I give tithes of all that I get” (
God is rightly jealous for his own honor.See discussion of God's attribute of jealousy, p. 205 above. Therefore he is not pleased to answer the prayers of the proud who take honor to themselves rather than giving it to him. True humility before God, which will also be reflected in genuine humility before others, is necessary for effective prayer.
Continuing in Prayer Over Time.
Just as Moses twice stayed on the mountain forty days before God for the people of Israel (
Sometimes, as in the case of Moses and Jacob, prayer over a long period of time may be prayer for one specific item (cf.
There is also an element of a continual fellowship with God in praying over time. Paul calls on us to “pray constantly” (
Praying Earnestly.
Jesus himself, who is our model for prayer, prayed earnestly. “In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard for his godly fear” (
In personal relationships, if we attempt to fake emotional intensity and put on an outward show of emotion that is not consistent with the feelings of our hearts, others involved will usually sense our hypocrisy at once and be put off by it. How much more is this true of God, who fully knows our hearts. Therefore, intensity and depth of emotional involvement in prayer should never be faked: we cannot fool God. Yet, if we truly begin to see situations as God sees them, if we begin to see the needs of a hurting and dying world as they really are, then it will be natural to pray with intense emotional involvement and to expect God, as a merciful Father, to respond to heartfelt prayer. And where such intensely felt prayer finds expression in group prayer meetings, Christians should certainly accept and be thankful for it, for it often indicates a deep work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the person praying.
Waiting on the Lord.
After crying out to God for help in distress, David says, “Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord!” (
I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning. (
An analogy from human experience may help us to appreciate the benefit of waiting before the Lord for a response to prayer. If I wish to invite someone home for dinner, there are various ways I can do so. First, I can issue a vague, general invitation: “It would be nice to have you come to dinner sometime.” Almost no one will come to dinner based on that kind of invitation alone. This is rather like the vague, general prayer, “God bless all my aunts and uncles and all the missionaries. Amen.” Second, I could make a specific but hurried and impersonal kind of invitation: “Fred, can you come to dinner Friday night at 6:00?—but as soon as the words are out of my mouth, I rush away leaving Fred with a puzzled expression on his face because I didn’t allow him time to respond. This is like many of our prayer requests. We simply speak words to God as if the very act of voicing them, without any heart involvement in what we are saying, will itself bring an answer from God. But this kind of request forgets that prayer is a relationship between two persons, myself and God.
There is a third kind of invitation, one that is heartfelt, personal, and specific. After waiting until I’m sure I have Fred’s full attention, I can look him directly in the eye and say, “Fred, Margaret and I would really love to have you come to dinner at our home this Friday at 6:00 p.m. Could you come?—and then, continuing to look him in the eye, I wait silently and patiently while he decides what to answer. He knows from my facial expression, my tone of voice, my timing, and the setting in which I chose to talk to him that I am putting my whole self into this request, and that I am relating to him as a person and as a friend. Waiting patiently for an answer shows my earnestness, my sense of expectancy, and my respect for him as a person. This third kind of request is like that of the earnest Christian who comes before God, gains a sense of being in his presence, earnestly pours out a request to him, and then waits quietly for some sense of assurance of God’s answer.
This is not to say that all our requests must be of this nature, or even that the first two kinds of requests are wrong. Indeed, in some situations we pray quickly because we have little time before we need an answer (see
Praying in Private.
Daniel went to his upper chamber and “got down upon his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God” (
The need to pray in private may also have implications for small-group or church prayer meetings: when believers come together to seek the Lord earnestly about a specific matter, it is often helpful if they can be in the privacy of a home where the door is shut and they can collectively cry out to God. Apparently this was the way the early Christians prayed when they were making earnest supplication to God for the release of Peter from prison (see
Praying with Others.
Believers find strength in praying together with others. In fact, Jesus teaches us, “Again, I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (
There are many other examples in Scripture where groups of believers prayed together or where one person led the entire congregation in prayer (note Solomon’s prayer “in the presence of all the assembly of Israel” at the dedication of the temple in
Fasting.
Prayer is often connected with fasting in Scripture. Sometimes these are occasions of intense supplication before God, as when Nehemiah, on hearing of the ruin of Jerusalem, “continued fasting and praying before the God of Heaven” (
In the New Testament, Anna was “worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day” (
So fasting appropriately accompanied prayer in many situations: in times of intensive intercession, repentance, worship, and seeking of guidance. In each of these situations, several benefits come from fasting, all of which affect our relationship to God: (1) Fasting increases our sense of humility and dependence on the Lord (for our hunger and physical weakness continually remind us how we are not really strong in ourselves but need the Lord). (2) Fasting allows us to give more attention to prayer (for we are not spending time on eating), and (3) it is a continual reminder that, just as we sacrifice some personal comfort to the Lord by not eating, so we must continually sacrifice all of ourselves to him.Similar reasons (devoting more time to prayer and giving up some personal pleasure) probably explain Paul's permission to married couples to give up sexual relations "by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer" (
“Yet even now,” says the Lord,
“return to me with all your heart,
with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;
and rend your hearts and not your garments.”
(
Though the New Testament does not specifically require that we fast, or set special times when we must fast, Jesus certainly assumes that we will fast, for he says to his disciples, “And when you fast” (
What About Unanswered Prayer?
We must begin by recognizing that as long as God is God and we are his creatures, there must be some unanswered prayers. This is because God keeps hidden his own wise plans for the future, and even though people pray, many events will not come about until the time that God has decreed. The Jews prayed for centuries for the Messiah to come, and rightly so, but it was not until “the time had fully come” that “God sent forth his Son” (
Prayer will also be unanswered because we do not always know how to pray as we ought (
When we face unanswered prayer, we join the company of Jesus, who prayed, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; nevertheless not my will, but yours, be done” (
When prayer remains unanswered we must continue to trust God, who “causes all things to work together for good” (
We also must continue to pray. Sometimes an answer, long awaited, will suddenly be given, as it was when Hannah after many years bore a child (
But sometimes prayers will remain unanswered in this life. At times God will answer those prayers after the believer dies. At other times he will not, but even then the faith expressed in those prayers and their heartfelt expressions of love for God and the people he has made will still ascend as a pleasing incense before God’s throne (
Praise and Thanksgiving
Praise and thanksgiving to God, which will be treated more fully in chapter 51, are an essential element of prayer. The model prayer that Jesus left us begins with a word of praise: “Hallowed be your name” (
By contrast, the kind of thanksgiving that appropriately accompanies prayer must express thankfulness to God for all circumstances, for every event of life that he allows to come to us. When we join our prayers with humble, childlike thanksgiving to God “in all circumstances” (
QUESTIONS FOR PERSONAL APPLICATION
SPECIAL TERMS
BIBLIOGRAPHY
(For an explanation of this bibliography see the note on the bibliography to chapter 1, p. 38. Complete bibliographical data may be found on pp. 1223-29.)
Sections in Evangelical Systematic Theologies
1. Anglican (Episcopalian)
1882-92 Litton, 431-32
2. Arminian (Wesleyan or Methodist)
1940 Wiley, 3:40-44, 153
1960 Purkiser, 421-24
1983- Cottrell, 2:353-708
3. Baptist
1907 Strong, 433-39
1917 Mullins, 119, 192, 224, 274, 348
1983-85 Erickson, 405-6
4. Dispensational
1947 Chafer, 5:220-31; 7:252-54
1949 Thiessen, 298-301
1986 Ryrie, 381-82
5. Lutheran
1917-24 Pieper, 3:215-19
1934 Mueller, 428-34, 467-69
6. Reformed (or Presbyterian)
1559 Calvin, 2:850-920 (3.20)
1724-58 Edwards, 2:74-88, 113-18
1871-73 Hodge, 3:692-709
1878 Dabney, 713-25
1937-66 Murray, CW 3:168-71
7. Renewal (or charismatic/Pentecostal)
1988-92 Williams, 2:295-98, 3:95-98
Sections in Representative Roman Catholic Systematic Theologies
1. Roman Catholic: Traditional
1955 Ott, 91
2. Roman Catholic: Post-Vatican II
1980 McBrien, 1:331-32; 2:1057-99
Other Works
Bennett, Arthur, ed. The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayer and Devotions. Edinburgh and Carlisle, Pa.: Banner of Truth, 1975.
Bounds, E.M. Power Through Prayer. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1963.
Brother Lawrence. The Practice of the Presence of God. New York: Revell, 1895.
Carson, D.A., ed. Teach Us To Pray: Prayer in the Bible and the World. Grand Rapids: Baker, and Exeter: Paternoster, 1990.
Clowney, Edmund. Christian Meditation. Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1979.
_______. “Prayer, Theology of.” In NDT pp. 526-27.
Forsyth, P.T. The Soul of Prayer. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967 (reprint).
Foster, Richard J. Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988.
Hallesby, O. Prayer. Trans. by Clarence J. Carlsen. Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1959 (reprint).
Houston, James. The Transforming Friendship. Oxford and Batavia, Ill.: Lion, 1989.
Hunter, W. Bingham. The God Who Hears. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1986.
Kelly, Thomas R. A Testament of Devotion. New York: Harper, 1941.
Law, William. A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1948 (reprint).
M’Intyre, D.M. The Hidden Life of Prayer. Minneapolis: Bethany Fellowship Press, 1962 (reprint). (The author’s name is sometimes spelled MacIntyre in other editions of this book.)
Murray, Andrew. The Ministry of Intercessory Prayer. Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1981 (reprint; originally published in 1897 as The Ministry of Intercession).
Ortlund, Raymond C., Jr. A Passion for God: Prayers and Meditations on the Book of Romans. Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 1994.
Prince, Derek. Shaping History Through Prayer and Fasting. Old Tappan, N.J.: Fleming H. Revell, 1973.
Smith, David R. Fasting: A Neglected Discipline. Fort Washington, Pa.: Christian Literature Crusade, 1969.
Spear, Wayne. The Theology of Prayer. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1979.
Thomas a Kempis. The Imitation of Christ. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1973 (reprint).
Unknown Christian. The Kneeling Christian. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1945.
Wallis, Arthur. God’s Chosen Fast: A Spiritual and Practical Guide to Fasting. Fort Washington, Pa.: Christian Literature Crusade, 1987.
White, John. Daring to Draw Near. Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1977.
Willard, Dallas. The Spirit of the Disciplines. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1988.
SCRIPTURE MEMORY PASSAGE
HYMN
“FROM EVERY STORMY WIND”
From ev’ry stormy wind that blows,
from ev’ry swelling tide of woes,
There is a calm, a sure retreat;
’tis found beneath the Mercy Seat.
There is a place where Jesus sheds
the oil of gladness on our heads,
A place than all besides more sweet;
it is the blood-stained Mercy Seat.
There is a spot where spirits blend,
where friend holds fellowship with friend,
Tho’ sundered far; by faith they meet
around the common Mercy Seat.
Ah, whither could we flee for aid,
when tempted, desolate, dismayed,
Or how the hosts of hell defeat,
had suff’ring saints no Mercy Seat?
There, there on eagle wings we soar,
and time and sense seem all no more,
And heav’n comes down our souls to greet,
and glory crowns the Mercy Seat.
O may my hand forget her skill,
my tongue be silent, cold, and still,
This bounding heart forget to beat,
if I forget the Mercy Seat.
Author: Hugh Stowell, 1828, 1831