Customer Reviews

Prayer in perfect form - By: Kurt Messick, 18 Sep 2003
There are few thingsin our lives that are as personal & touch us as deeply as prayer, particularly our own prayer life. We each feel we are an expert at prayingin our own ways, & to a large extent, each of us is. For this deep part of our lives to be co-opted by a feeling of selfish intention for personal gain is tragic. This is why I considered 'The Prayer of Jabez' problematic - the author's intent might not be selfishness, but the message being heard is precisely that.

In searching for an alternative to hold up as a model morein keeping with my own prayer temperament, Charles Allen, a theology professor at my seminary, directed me to James Mulholland's 'Praying Like Jesus: The Lord's Prayerin a Culture of Prosperity.'

The book begins where the disciples of Jesus began -- Thomas asks Jesus to teach them how to pray. In an interesting, fictional conversation, the disciples recount their experience of praying another prayer that seems to work better for them (of course, this is the prayer of Jabez). Many followers of Jesus seem to slink away after hearing Jesus tell people that they should stop asking for an increasein territory, but rather ask God to provide for their needs; that they should stop asking for a blessingin earthly terms, but rather be willing to follow the will of God even to death, to 'take up their crosses & follow'. This teaching is too hard to follow!

'This is not what happened two thousand years ago. Unfortunately, it is happening todayin thousands of churches & with millions of Christians. ... Thousands of Christians are repeating an obscure prayer first uttered by a man named Jabez over three thousand years ago. Many have become convinced his words are the formula for prosperity.'

As Mulholland points out correctly, Wilkinson did not intend his prayer to become a manifesto for righteous greed. He also points out that neither Jabez nor the Bible hold up the prayer of Jabez as a model for anyone but Jabez to follow.

'This honour is reserved for another short prayer locatedin the gospels of Matthew & Luke. It is the prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray. We call this prayer The Lord's Prayer, though I prefer to call it the Prayer of Jesus.'

Mulholland does not promise riches or special healing or power; he does not give the magic formula for getting what you want. What he does is reiterate the intentions of Jesus with the Prayer of Jesus -- an opportunity to reconnect with God & with each other through the words that, as the disciple Peter said, 'contain eternal life'.

The first chapter is entitled When You Pray. This, of course, assumes that you pray. Not if, but when. Mulholland talks about the prayer of self-righteousness & the prayer of self-interest. These prayers are one-communication, but even worse than that, they are directive or instructive, as if God needs to be told what to do or informed of something God did not yet know (such as, how good we've been lately). God is putin the mode of Santa Claus. Jesus gives a corrective to this.

'Praying like Jesus offers far more than prosperity. When prayed with sincerity, it cleanses our hearts of self-righteousness & strips our motives of self-interest. It challenges the false & inappropriate ways we approach God & each other. It reminds us of what we so easily forget -- our proper relationship to God & the world.'

Praying like Jesus reminds us of God more than it invokes ourselves. Praying like Jesus also reminds us of our needs as a community. This prayer is a prayer for the world, a worldin which the will of God is primary.

The other chapters give insights into the particular parts of the Lord's Prayer: chapter titles include Our Father, Thy Kingdom Come, Give Us, Forgive Us, & Deliver Us. Each of these chapters stress the love of God for us, the importance of community, the importance of relationship, & the need to see who & where we arein right respect of God. This is not a prayer for become rich & famous, which is the trap of much of current culture, including the prayer of Jabez & many other 'Christian' things.

'This obsession with material blessing, at the expense of the spiritual, is a congenital disease. Being born an American is to be so afflicted. Jim Bakker was merely the most blatant prophet of a philosophy to which most of us pledge allegiance. His lifestyle was an exaggeration of a nearly universal merger of religious life & the predominant values of our culture. He sprinkled holy water on the American way.'

Of course, one of the problems with the Lord's Prayer is that it has become, for most Christians, an almost genetically-encoded prayer routine that it is done without thinking. Unfortunately, this means it is almost always done with comprehension on any level; it is just one more part of the liturgy that we sayin our drive to get on & get through on our way to the next thing. Praying like Jesus requires us to pay attention, & pay attention deeply. Mulholland's final wordin the conclusion is a charge for us to regain this attention & incorporate the prayer anew into our lives deeply & with meaning that it hasin abundance, but which we've missed for so long.