Christian Living

In a previous post we looked at the power of prayer. We learned a vital lesson – one which at first blush sounds a bit odd, but one which in fact affirms a very basic biblical truth. We learned that there is no power in prayer. That is, there is no power in the act of prayer itself. The power of prayer is not in the act of praying, but in the God of Power and Might who accomplishes His will on earth as it is in heaven through the instrument of prayer. 

To illustrate the point, we considered two separate arguments. First, we saw how almost all religions of the world extol the act of prayer as a core discipline of their particular religious practice. Muslims are enjoined to pray five times daily. Hindu men are called upon to pray three times a day. Members of the Baha’i faith, depending on which particular plan of personal devotion they happen to choose, are encouraged to pray up to five times daily as a spiritual discipline. 

Now unless we are to believe that all religions are essentially teaching the same basic ideas and worshiping the same God, we are forced by sheer logic to conclude that there cannot be an equal efficacy to the prayers of peoples of all religions. Though peoples of all faiths engage in a similar-appearing act of prayer, which from an outside observer’s perspective would seem to represent the same basic phenomenon, are we as Christians to believe that this act of prayer is equally attended by supra-human power regardless of who is doing the praying or before whom the prayers are submitted? Of course not. The power of prayer is not in the act of prayer, but in God – the one and only true God who has revealed Himself in creation and Scripture – who accomplishes His will through our prayers. 

Second, we witnessed how Elijah’s confrontation with the prophets of Baal helped to illustrate the true power of prayer. The prophets of Baal prayed to their god all day long. The sincerity of their devotion – testified to most graphically by their bloody self-mutilation – was then and is still unquestionable. But their result – or lack of result – is striking. 1 Kings 18:29 reads: “But there was no voice; no one answered, no one paid attention.” The reason that there was no answer was that they were petitioning a non-existent deity! There was no power in their prayers because they were praying to a false god! Were there power in prayer itself, this would have been a prime opportunity to see that power manifested. But, alas, there is no power in prayer – just in the Almighty God of heaven and earth, the One who made Himself known when called upon by the prophet Elijah to hear his prayer to turn the peoples’ hearts back to the God of Israel.  

So we concluded last week: there is no power in prayer itself. There is, however,  immeasurable power in the All-powerful and Sovereign God, Maker of heaven and earth, who has ordained prayer as one of the primary means by which He accomplishes His will on earth. 

Moving on from here, then, I think it is fair to follow up with a further line of questioning, namely this: why does God so often use prayer to accomplish His will? And, as we begin to look at the Book of Acts to see how the early church engaged in prayer, what can be gleaned from those texts that might help shed light on the question, why pray?

Let us look today at just one example from Acts chapter 1, a passage in which God reveals His will through the prayers of the eleven remaining apostles. Weeks before, Judas had betrayed the Savior, having sold Him out for a mere thirty pieces of silver. Overcome with remorse, Judas went and hung himself. Now, after Christ ascended back to heaven, the remaining eleven apostles of the Lord gathered together to choose a replacement for Judas to become an apostolic witness to Christ’s resurrection. 

This is what you might call a major decision. Years later, the Apostle Paul would write to the church at Ephesus that the church was “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.” The apostles of the Lord – those eyewitnesses of the resurrection who, according to Acts 1:21-22, accompanied the Eleven from the days of John the Baptist all the way to the ascension of Christ – formed the very foundation on which the church of Jesus Christ was built. Adding an apostle was no ordinary decision! 

It is instructive to us, then, to observe the means by which the Eleven made their final selection, or more precisely, discovered which one it was that God had selected for Himself. After canvassing the potential candidates in accordance with the essential requirements stated in verses 21-22, the apostles presented two qualified men before the Lord, Barsabbas and Matthias. Acts 1:24-26 thus reads: “And they prayed and said, ‘You, Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which one of these two you have chosen to take the place in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas turned aside to go to his own place.’ And they cast lots for them, and the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.”

To “cast lots” probably means that marked stones were placed in a jar, shaken up, then the one whose stone fell out first was selected. While this is the last time we read in Scripture of lot-casting, it nevertheless should not be viewed as the early leaders of the church giving the decision over to mere chance. Indeed, Proverbs 16:33 says “the lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD.” Apparently, both Barsabbas and Matthias were equally qualified. The Eleven were not casting lots over a moral question, or one regarding spiritual qualification. They were choosing between two good options. But more than their choosing, they were seeking to know the one whom God had chosen. That is precisely what they prayed for: “O Lord, show us which one You have chosen.” 

If a reader were to skip from verse 23 to verse 26, he would see the same ultimate result: two equally qualified men put forward from which one, Matthias, is chosen to join the Eleven to replace Judas. But verses 24 and 25 give us the heart of the matter and the lesson for today. The Eleven were not just concerned with filling a vacancy. No, much more importantly, they were concerned with knowing the mind of God and with being instruments through which He could reveal His will. They did not determine the will of God through prayer; they discovered it. They’re prayer was not the power which effected the decision; rather, they’re prayer was the instrument through which God effectively revealed His decision.

But let’s explore another important element of prayer, one that is testified to in this very passage. There are any number of ways in which God could have seen to it that Matthias became the twelfth apostle to replace Judas. If we believe that God is sovereign and will ultimately accomplish His will, then we seemingly have every reason to believe that God’s will concerning Matthias would have come to pass one way or another. But by revealing His will through the prayers of the apostles, God revealed something to them, and by extension to us, that we simply cannot miss. By making known and accomplishing His will through prayer, God is telling us that He wants us to be intimately involved in the very process by which His will is accomplished.

Recall a point we made last week: as the Sovereign God, our Lord declares the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done (Isa. 46:10). But God not only declares the ends; He also prescribes the means. And for much of what God desires to accomplish on this earth, He has prescribed that His will be accomplished through the means of prayer. God is a God who desires to involve us in His work! He doesn’t just do His will; He does His will through us! He wants us to witness Him at work. He wants us to be a very part of what He is doing. He wants to build up our faith in Him by having us petition Him concerning His will, then accomplishing that will before our very eyes, even with direct reference to our prayers. 

Consider this more commonplace example. You are without a job. You are down and out. You have a family to feed, and you can’t feed them. There’s a knock at your door. You open the door and there’s a bag of groceries on your door mat. How great is that? Your family has food for a day!

But how much greater it could be if we inserted just a few critical additions. You are without a job. You are down and out. You have a family to feed, and you can’t feed them. You bow before your Heavenly Father and cry out, “Father, help me to feed my family! Let my family see that You are real and that You really care.” Then there’s a knock at your door. You open the door and there’s a man and a woman who tell you that while they were praying last night, God spoke to them about your particular need and instructed them to bless you with these provisions. Now, how great is that? Your family has food for a day. But far more important to God, your family has witnessed firsthand His care and concern for their well-being!

You see, God does not just want to provide for us. He wants us to know that He is the One providing for us! God does not just want us to help others in their need. He wants us to know that it is He who gives us the means and the heart to help others in their need. He doesn’t just do His will under a cloak of darkness. He wants us to be involved in the very accomplishment of His will. 

Now what about the decision-making that took place in Acts 1? God desired that the Eleven – and presumably the rest of the infant church – all know that He had specifically appointed Matthias and that the decision was not merely a haphazard chance event. But rather than just have Matthias show up one day as the replacement, He involved others in the very process itself – through the instrument of prayer – so that those involved have a faith-building experience and through that experience learn to subject themselves, not merely to the discipline of prayer, but to the One who accomplishes His will through the means of prayer. He wants us to know that He is the Power of prayer. 

Do you have some significant decisions to make in your life today? Are you deciding on a career move? What college to attend? A relationship? Are you part of a search team at a church considering a pastoral candidate? Whatever the case, perhaps your particular decision does not rise to the magnitude of selecting an apostle to be part of the foundation of the universal church. Nevertheless, your decision is important to you – and to God. It’s not really the magnitude of the decision that matters. It is God’s desire to magnify Himselfby revealing and accomplishing His will through our prayers. That is why God calls on us to pray. 

Remember: prayer is not so much about us getting our will done in heaven; it is about God inviting us to be His instruments through which He accomplishes His will here on earth. Prayer is not about us “twisting God’s arm” to see things our way. It is about us submitting ourselves to the will of God as revealed in the word of God, and asking God to accomplish those things in our lives in tangible ways that bring us into close and intimate contact with Him and involve us in the very process. Just like with the Eleven as they sought the Lord about a replacement for Judas, God wants us to be intimately involved as instrumental means through which He brings about His desired ends.   

So why does God use prayer to accomplish His will and what do we learn from this passage in Acts regarding prayer? That the Omnipotent and Sovereign God wants us to be involved in the very accomplishment of His will – not so we can think that our prayers were the effective power, but that He effectively used our prayers as means to bring about His desired ends. As Jesus instructed us to pray: “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” 

No. There is no power in prayer. Let me repeat that in case you missed it: there is no power in prayer. None.

While at first blush such a statement might seem offensive – even blasphemous, a little explanation will reveal that in reality the claim is not at all outrageous. In fact, it’s almost basic. 

Allow me to elaborate on the point this way: do not most major religions promote the discipline and practice of prayer? Of course they do. For example, one of the Five Pillars of Islam, those core religious obligations that summarize Muslim worship and practice, is prayer. Likewise, high-caste Hindu men are instructed to perform prayers of devotion three times a day: at sunrise, noon and sunset. The youngest religion in the world, the Baha’i faith, enjoins its devotees to pray once, thrice, or five times daily depending on one’s personal plan of devotion. 

So you see that prayer is a universal practice among religious observers. It is almost intuitive to associate religious observance – whatever the religion – with some form of the practice of prayer. But are we to believe on that basis that there is power in prayer, regardless of who is doing the praying or to whom the prayers are directed? Are we to believe that other-worldly, trans-human power attends the very act of petitioning the god of one’s choice simply owing to the nature of the act of prayer itself? 

I submit that for the Christian, for one who abides by the supernatural revelation of the One and only true God, the answer is obvious and negative. The truth is, there is no power in the act of prayer. Instead, the power resides in the One to whom we pray. It is the God revealed in the pages of the Bible, the God who is both Creator and Sustainer of all that has come to exist, the God who is the Author and Finisher of our faith – it is in that God that all power originates and flows, including the divine power released through the act of prayer. We can turn to God’s word as well and witness firsthand the futility of God-less prayer. 

In one of the most dramatic scenes in all the Bible, recorded in 1 Kings 18, the prophet Elijah, giving bold testimony to the one true God, openly challenges the false prophets and followers of Baal to demonstrate whether there is any power in their prayers or, more importantly, in the god to whom they pray. Elijah cried out, “How long will you falter between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” 

After outlining the provisions of his daring challenge, Elijah instructed the followers of Baal, “then you call on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the LORD; and the God who answers by fire, He is God.” Notice what Elijah is doing: he is forcing the wavering Israelites to concede that there is a clear connection between what is true about reality, and what is true about prayer. If Baal is the true God, then of course he should be able and willing to demonstrate as much when called upon by his devotees to provide such awe-inspiring evidence. If, however, Baal is a false and non-existent deity and instead it is the God of Israel who actually exists and is as He has revealed Himself to be, then He will demonstrate that before the eyes of all in a compelling display of raw and supernatural power. 

Now the point of the story for us today is not that we are to challenge everyone who adheres to a non-Christian view of reality to prove the truth of their religion by means of a public display of power. Nor are we to put God to the test to perform such acts at our behest. The story of Elijah is informative, not normative. It does not provide a prescription for how we can get God to prove that He is indeed God. 

But what we do want to gain from recalling this historic event is the clear illustration that there is no power in prayer as prayer, but only in the true God who responds to our prayers and displays His power through them. The prophets of Baal cried out to their god: “O Baal, hear us!” They cried out all day; they ritually cut themselves with knives and lances, desperate to coax a response from their god. “But there was no voice; no one answered, no one paid attention.” If ever there was power in prayer itself, this would seem to have been an excellent opportunity for an impressive display of that power. But there is no power in prayer itself, only in the God of Power and Might who works through our prayers. And that is exactly what happened on Mount Carmel. We read in the text: “And it came to pass, at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet came near and said, ‘LORD God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that You are God in Israel and I am Your servant, and that I have done all these things at Your word. Hear me, O LORD, hear me, that this people may know that You are the LORD God, and that You have turned their hearts back to You again.’”

What happened next is both familiar and remarkable: “Then the fire of the LORD fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood and the stones and the dust and it licked up the water that was in the trench. Now when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and they said, “Wow, there is power in prayer!!” 

Well, not exactly. Of course that is not what they said. Instead, they exclaimed with fearful trembling, “The LORD, He is God! The LORD, He is God!” 

No: there is no power in prayer itself. Otherwise, in all likelihood, the prophets of Baal would have carried the day. After all, who can question their sincerity and devotion? Who doubts their discipline and commitment to the practice of prayer? Who wonders whether they were “true believers” in the alleged power of their petitions? They prayed all day and even drew blood from their own bodies just to prove their sincerity. But in the end, we discover this indispensable and timeless truth: power is not ultimately in prayer itself or in the practice of prayer, but in the God of Power and Might who is real and true. The LORD, He is God!

Thus, while prayer might be a discipline practiced near universally, unlike other common human practices it is not done so with equal efficacy. For instance, the habit of healthy eating generally contributes to the physical well-being of an individual regardless of what religion he happens to practice. In a similar way, the discipline of regular exercise typically enhances the health of an individual – irrespective of her religious convictions. The discipline and habit of prayer, on the other hand, while perhaps making a person more ceremoniously religious or even self-disciplined, is not attended with divine power unless it is prayer that is submitted unto the only true God in heaven and in accordance with His revealed will. To repeat: as the prophets of Baal discovered, there is no power in prayer itself; but there is unimaginable power released through prayer when the omnipotent God, the One who breathed out the heavens and the earth and holds all creation in sustained existence, acts on behalf of our petitions. 

There are many things to consider along with this point. First, when we realize that the power is not in the act of prayer itself but in the Eternal and Omniscient God who acts through our prayers, then our focus is shifted from ourselves to our Lord and Savior. James chastised his readers: “You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.” (4:3) By remembering that the power of prayer is none other than a Person – the all-powerful God Himself, our minds are turned to contemplate His perfect will and not just our immediate pleasures. 

Second, when we realize that our prayers are powerful only when they become an instrument through which God displays His glorious power, then we can begin to grasp that prayer is not about us getting our will done in heaven, but about the Sovereign God revealing and performing His heavenly will through us on earth. Recall Jesus’ instruction to His disciples: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (Matt. 6:9-10)

There is one final idea for us to contemplate this morning. We might be tempted to question, if God is sovereign over all the earth and if, as the Apostle Paul wrote to the Ephesians, God “works all things according to the counsel of His own will,” then why should we bother to pray at all? If God’s will is going to be done, then why pray that God’s will be done? 

We could answer: “because God said to pray.” But this answer seems unsatisfactory. It is certainly true that as the Sovereign of the universe, God could plausibly command His creatures to do things without offering an explanation of His purposes. But the Bible does not reveal a demanding God who is concerned only with us obeying His sovereign and omnipotent will. Rather, the Bible reveals a loving God who desires to relate to and with His creation in an intimate and meaningful way. Recall what King David wrote in Psalm 103:7: “He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of Israel.” God displayed His powerful acts of deliverance and sustenance before the children of Israel as He miraculously delivered them from Egyptian bondage and led them through the wilderness on their way to the Promised Land. Yet, while Israel witnessed these mighty acts, Moses was privy to the ways of God! He knew the very heart of God, not just that the manna, as promised, was delivered on schedule every morning except the Sabbath. 

Dear Christian, what we have in Christ – the intimacy we can have with God in Christ – is greater than anything Moses could experience because we have the permanence of the indwelling Spirit of God who “also helps in our weaknesses, making intercession for us with groanings too deep for words.” Even though the face of Moses was radiant as a result of his intimate contact with the God of Israel, his glory faded – it passed away. But, for us, “the ministry of righteousness exceeds much more in glory.” In this New Covenant, as we are in Christ and Christ is in us, we have a glory that exceeds even Moses, the one who knew the very ways of God while most others around him only saw God’s acts. 

So back to our question: why does a Sovereign God call us to prayer? Is it merely because “God said so”? Of course, we should not and must not dismiss the fact that we are exhorted to prayer by the inspired and inerrant word of God. But could there be another reason – one in keeping with the loving nature of God and His desire to involve us in His work? 

As the Sovereign God, our Lord declares the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done. (Isa 46:10) But God not only declares the ends; He also prescribes the means. And for much of what God desires to accomplish on this earth, He has prescribed that His will be accomplished through the means of prayer. 

For our prayers to be filled with power, they first must be addressed in the Name of the one true God and none other. Prayer itself is not powerful; the God who answers our prayers, however, is infinitely powerful. And, like the practice of the early church in Acts, let us remember that prayer is not so much about us getting our will done in heaven; it is really about God inviting us to be instruments through which He accomplishes His will here on earth. 

Scripture teaches that faith alone is the condition for salvation. A simple evidence of this is that the explicitly evangelistic gospel of John never once mentions repentance as a condition for salvation, but repeatedly exhorts us to faith (Jn. 1:12, 3:16, 6:47, 7:38, 11:25, 14:1, 20:31). Furthermore, salvation is clearly by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8) and no degree of repentance divorced from faith can be said to save anyone (e.g. Matt. 27:3-5; 2 Cor. 7:9-10)

But true saving faith, while not simply a synonym for repentance, undoubtedly includes the element of repentance. The emphatic teaching of Scripture is that “God now commands all men everywhere to repent” (Acts 17:30). Hence, faith and repentance should be viewed as two sides of the same coin, with faith being the “positive” side and repentance being the “negative” side. While repentance departs from unbelief in the gospel, faith is the positive inclination toward trust in the gospel. Repentance is “leaving there,” while faith is “coming here.”

Another way to look at faith and repentance is through the law of non-contradiction. The Bible describes saving faith as “being fully persuaded that what God has promised He is also able to perform” (Rom. 4:21). There are only two relationships a sinner can have in regards to Christ: either the sinner has saving faith in Christ or the sinner does not have saving faith in Christ. And to have saving faith in Christ is not the same as to not have saving faith in Christ.

Therefore, when a sinner exercises saving faith in Christ, he by that very act “repents” of the previous state of not having exercised saving faith in Christ. In other words, God’s call to repentance is the call to faith, and His call to faith is the call to repentance.