Prayer Thoughts, part 5
Take a moment to reflect on your personal prayer life. I want you to consider everything from common prayers before a meal to bedtime prayers by yourself or with your family. What primarily makes up the content of your prayers? You, like many others, likely pray for numerous issues. There may be a period of thanking God for numerous blessings, including family and daily provisions as well as spiritual blessings that are provided through Jesus. Since you love and care for others, you likely pray for the well-being of those who are struggling for various reasons. Also, you probably take some time to pray for personal issues.
All these things are good. However, a thought occurred to me in the past that created a paradigm shift in my personal prayer life. The thought stemmed from what I witnessed as typical public prayer and church practice. My thought was similar to a concern that I heard another publicly express. He questioned if, by the content of a church’s prayer life, a person might conclude that the number one enemy of most congregations is cancer. Cancer, by his usage, really meant sickness, illness, or physical limitation.
Through reflection, I realized that, by a significant margin, the primary content of churches that I was personally involved with were centered on this very idea. Our “prayer list” consisted predominantly of needs for physical healing. Our worship prayers and classroom prayers clearly indicated substantial thought to these desires. Another thought occurred to me, in conjunction with this, as I reflected on Paul’s prayer examples in the New Testament. He never once, in his writing, either prayed specifically for an individual healing, or instructed a congregation to pray to God on behalf of a personal illness.
So, am I advocating to stop praying for those who are sick? Allow me to be very clear – NO, I am not. I pray often for those who are suffering physically. However, it does create an opportunity for contemplation. Consider 2 Timothy 4.20. Paul left Trophimus, who was ill, in Miletus. Since Paul only mentions this fact, I do not presume anything beyond this. But this is the perfect time for Paul to do what we naturally do – ask the congregation to pray for his fellow worker. But, he didn’t. There is a similar instance in 1 Timothy 5.23. Paul instructed Timothy to take a little wine for medicinal reasons for his personal “ailments” (ESV). Something seems missing here. It is possible that Paul was praying for him, but he failed to mention it. He also failed to mention that he would have others pray for him too.
As I mentioned earlier, things I would naturally see in our common practice do not exist in Paul’s writing. Why? Truthfully, I do not believe I have the correct answer. Although, I think the best possibility may be found in 2 Corinthians 1.8-11. Paul and his companions were burdened to the point that death was a real possibility. Paul acknowledged the positive impact of their prayers in this situation. But what was he seeking in those prayers? Was he just grateful that his life was spared? Considering his view on life in Philippians 1.23, I highly doubt it. In fact, according to that text, he preferred death so that he could be with God. But in this case, I think his reasoning in 1 Corinthians 1.8-11 was like Philippians 1.19-26. His life mattered, first and foremost, because of his work for the Lord.
So, what does all this mean? I think Paul’s prayers illustrate conclusively that sickness, disease, and even death are not our greatest enemy and should not be treated as such. If that is true, then should this be our greatest priority in prayer? I encourage you to wrestle with this for yourself. But I do know the following truth. Nearly all of the content of Paul’s recorded prayers is in relation to the work of God. Should our practice reflect the same mindset? Or, could it be a slight wake-up call that maybe our priorities are not the same as Paul’s and therefore our prayers may be more in line with our own personal priorities?
I understand well that Paul is not the only writer in the New Testament. For me, James 5.13-16 was previously the foundation for what I have called our “typical” practice. However, I have since questioned whether I was even interpreting this text correctly. At a minimum, it is at least debatable whether James even refers to physical healing in this text. Whether he does or not, this does not change the emphasis placed on the content of Paul’s prayers recorded for us.
This article is a challenge for you to examine your prayer life in relation to the biblical picture of prayer among the New Testament church. It is an opportunity for you to meditate on your priorities as well as your desires that you present to our heavenly Father. Personally, I think the answer is not to be found in eliminating certain aspects of our current prayer practice, but rather adding more time in prayer for the issues that Paul constantly addressed.