Over every mountain there is a path, although it may not be seen from the valley.
- Theodore Roethke
Secular and religious alike hope to find answers to life's ultimate questions. Christians seek to know and serve Christ, creation's transcendent and intimate Creator and Savior. Yet more often than not, even devout believers feel discouraged and somewhat alienated by God's apparent silence and distance.
Failing to fully encounter the Kingdom of God's transformative power, many succumb to disappointment, doubting the fairness or goodness of God. Such feelings raise important questions. Can God be authentically and reliably experienced? Does Scripture actually offer an inward manifestation of the very person and presence of the Almighty? If so, is this a process and/or event? What hinderances might there be to developing the Kingdom of God within? Does the Bible offer insight and instruction on how we can grow in God?
Prayer is the most natural way to respond to God. Childlike in simplicity, lifting our thoughts and feelings towards Heaven expands the soul. Reaching up, we hope to both touch and be touched by the presence of Divine peace and power, forgiveness and love.
Even so, the elephant in the room remains obvious. Prayer is broken. Particularly within Christian circles, this inconvenient truth is rarely spoken. Yet, the fact remains that like a stopped clock, bonafide answers to prayer are occasional at best.
An often overlooked question is in regards to levels of prayer. Unfortunately many presume that simply tossing up a prayer now and then should suffice. Serious prayer is more a process than event. Progressing along the path of regular and lengthly prayer is a true reflection of compassion and care, exemplified by the level of our diligent and appropriate response:
- Wishful Thinking: This introductory style of prayer is largely spontaneous. It knows little of Scripture or spiritual experience. Disappointment in this arena accounts for billions prematurely deciding Biblical authority and faith is unreasonable. Thus signaling both the beginning and end of honestly pursuing the answers to life’s ultimate questions.
- Prayer On the Go: The next incremental investment for most of Churchianity might loosely be described as phoning it in. Nearly synonymous with windshield time, it’s basically little more than wishful thinking expressed with slightly more quantity and quality.
- Pausing For Prayer: Hundreds of millions recognize the need to at least treat God with the respect due a stranger. Rather than daydreaming on the run, these pause for at least a moment now and then, pitching a prayer heavenward hoping it will stick. Unfortunately, this level may exemplify, or even exceed the commitment level of the average modern Christian.
- Attaching A Scripture: Those interested enough to admit septs 1-3 rarely work often try increasing their odds by adding a Bible promise. Unfortunately the vast majority of Christians remain basically prayerless, stopping to pray less than ten minutes a day. Adding to our dilemma is massive Biblically illiteracy. The inability to quote, much less correctly understand 10 verses in a row. Most, adding a Scriptural promise to lukewarm prayers, do so with little or no concern as to the corresponding conditions of such passages.
- Occasional Intercession: The next common waypoint along the path of developing a committed prayer life is the occasional investment of 30 minutes or so practicing the art of intercession. When answers are more miss than hit, believers are left with 3 options. (1) Give up: Some go so far as to create mistaken doctrines like cessation to justify spiritual failures. (2) Pretend: The favored choice of hundreds of millions, charismatic or not. (3) Seek God’s Face: The serious study and whole hearted implementation of Scripture.
- If My People: God’s perfect plan for repentance is found in 2 Chronicles 7:14. Those putting this simple algebraic formula into practice soon develop the spiritual insight to become Prophetic Christians on their way to judging all things.
- Scheduled Intercession: Upping the ante can be done individually or collectively. Nevertheless, as with nearly all Christian disciplines, efforts are far more effective when done in concert. Corporate meetings should reflect a quality and quantity of prayer indicative of the difficulties being addressed.
- Sanctification: Devotees interested in learning to pray effectually soon feel the need for growth in radical personal and corporate sanctification and discipleship.
- Pressing In: When prayer still largely goes unanswered, the committed soldier on, doubling down through triple fasting; i.e. food, prayer and good deeds.
- Praying Through: When all is said and done, those refusing to take no for an answer redouble their efforts with semiweekly, if not daily, extended times of prayer. Practicing 1 or more of the 7 prayer modes, they major on being still and waiting on God through the prayer of silence. Such rare men and women give God no rest, day and night, until they and those for whom they pray are demonstrably filled with both the fruit and gifts of the Holy Spirit. They remain committed to travailing in prayer to the point of prevailing with men and circumstances, Satan and God.
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