Why? by Hamilton Adam;

Author:Hamilton, Adam;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Abingdon Press
Published: 2018-08-15T00:00:00+00:00

The Purpose of Prayer

Throughout this chapter we have focused on what people call intercessory prayer: prayer that asks for God’s intervention and help. I’d like to end by suggesting that, perhaps, prayer is not primarily about intercession at all.

God is not a divine vending machine—we slip in a prayer and out pops a miracle. In preparation for writing the sermons upon which this book is based, I asked my Facebook friends their thoughts on prayer (visit Pastor Adam Hamilton and “like” to participate in these conversations in the future). “Jim” wrote, “Maybe thinking of prayer as something that needs to be ‘answered’ is asking the wrong question. Maybe prayer is something like ‘entering into a relationship,’ or ‘yielding our lives to God.’ [Maybe it’s] less of a transaction [and] more of an investment or even a communion.” I think Jim is right!

Similarly, “Anne” wrote, “Prayer too often has become our way of instructing God on how to run the world. To me, it is simply conversation with God.” She went on to offer a great analogy. She suggested that prayer might be like what we experienced as children when we were hurt and would climb up in our mothers’ laps for comfort. Their way of making everything okay was simply to hold us tightly and reassure us that somehow everything was going to be okay.

I began this chapter with a story about a young female pastor whose unborn child died despite the prayers of her congregation, and her subsequent struggle to believe in God. Her e-mail to me told of the dark place she went through during that time but also of God’s comfort and sustaining presence in the midst of her disbelief and anger. Eventually, her question changed from “Why?” to “What now?” As time passed, she came to understand that God did not intend the death of her unborn child; nor does God usually intervene miraculously to stop hard things from happening. Instead God walked with her, comforted her, and eventually called her, out of her pain, to be the answer to the prayers of three little Russian girls who needed a mommy. She and her husband adopted these little girls, and the lives of all five, mother and father and these three little girls, were forever changed. She ended her e-mail describing to me her utter gratitude for the blessings of God.

I end this chapter on prayer with one final quote, from World War II Admiral Chester Nimitz, who described his own experience of prayer over the course of his lifetime,

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