Prayer and Faith (Part 1): “Lord, teach us to pray...”

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Chapter 11 of the Gospel of Luke starts out with Jesus praying in a certain place and, when he finished, one of his disciples asked, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.” It seems that, over 2,000 years later, we still can’t quite figure it out.

In his book, When God Doesn’t Answer Your Prayer, Gerald Sittser uses the analogy of prayer being like a “blank check.” He writes:

We know we can’t ask God for just anything. We must make reasonable requests. In short, we must pray according to God’s will. If prayer were a blank check, we would need two signatures to cash it in. One would be our signature; the other would be God’s signature. God himself must sign off on our requests. He must give final approval. (pp 124)

Gregory Boyd, in his book, Satan and the Problem of Evil, also uses the blank check analogy:

God’s will is like a business check that must be cosigned in order to be validated. We the church are the cosigning party, and prayer is our signing. Hence the essence of prayer is, as Jesus taught, to align our will with the Father’s will—to cosign his will, as it were—so that his rule is established “on earth as it is in heaven”. (Mt 6:10) (pp234)

Although they use the same analogy, Boyd sees God as giving us a blank check – already signed – in order to empower his people to act in his behalf. We are the co-signing party which finalizes the spiritual transaction. Sittser, on the other hand, sees God as withholding his signature until he’s certain we’re spending it responsibly.

Jerry Sittser holds a master of divinity degree from Fuller Theological Seminary. Greg Boyd holds a master of divinity degree from Yale Divinity School and a Ph.D from Princeton Theological Seminary. If two bible scholars such as these cannot agree on something so fundamental to Christianity such as prayer, what hope is there for the rest of us?

The reason why Sittser and Boyd do not agree is because each one has a different view of how the spirit world operates. Sittser believes that everything that happens on the earth somehow fits into God’s secret plan – a divinely ordained blueprint, which is hidden from us. Although we ought to pray for things like a friend’s healing or that a loved one’s life be spared, God’s sovereign (i.e., hidden) will may dictate otherwise. Therefore, he may withhold his signature on the blank check.

Boyd, on the other hand, believes in a warfare worldview, in which Satan is actively (and often successfully) thwarting God’s will. For this reason, Boyd views prayer as fundamentally a warfare activity. Quoting another author, he says that prayer is not just a two-way transaction – it also involves the principalities and powers that hinder what God is able to do on the earth. God wants his will carried out on the earth, but he wants it carried out in cooperation with him. His will is not accomplished unless we are in communication with him on it.

There are plenty of issues Christians do not agree on... and when these are non-salvation issues, then I think we ought to agree to disagree. But when it involves an issue as vital as prayer, I find it difficult not to weigh in. What do you think? Can God’s will can be hindered in any way? Or is everything that happens divinely ordained? Your worldview, be it Boyd’s or Sisster’s, will affect how you pray.

Stay tuned... I’ll weight in on this topic in Part Two.