A Call to Spiritual Reformation: Priorities from Paul and His Prayers

by D.A. Carson

it is depressing, because it frequently coexists with abounding Christian activity that somehow seems hollow, frivolous, and superficial. Scarcely less disturbing is the enthusiastic praying in some circles that overflows with emotional release but is utterly uncontrolled by any thoughtful reflection on the prayers of Scripture.

So much of our religion is packaged to address our felt needs—and these are almost uniformly anchored in our pursuit of our own happiness and fulfillment.

We are not captured by his holiness and his love; his thoughts and words capture too little of our imagination, too little of our discourse, too few of our priorities.

But if we seek these things without passionately desiring a deeper knowledge of God, we are selfishly running after God’s blessings without running after him.

“What a man is alone on his knees before God, that he is, and no more.”

When was the last time we came away from a period of intercession feeling that, like Jacob or Moses, we had prevailed with God?

Granted that most of us know some individuals who are remarkable prayer warriors, is it not nevertheless true that by and large we are better at organizing than agonizing? Better at administering than interceding? Better at fellowship than fasting? Better at entertainment than worship? Better at theological articulation than spiritual adoration? Better—God help us!—at preaching than at praying?

What we actually do reflects our highest priorities. That means we can proclaim our commitment to prayer until the cows come home, but unless we actually pray, our actions disown our words.

But after all the difficulties have been duly recognized and all the dangers of legalism properly acknowledged, the fact remains that unless we plan to pray we will not pray. The reason we pray so little is that we do not plan to pray.

The danger in this one, as in all of them, is that the person who is formally conforming to such a régime may delude himself or herself into thinking that the discipline is an end in itself, or ensures one of an exalted place in the heavenlies.

I am primarily thinking of more private groups of carefully selected prayer warriors. The ground rules for such groups may include the following: (1) Those who agree to participate must do so every week, without fail and without complaint, for a set period of time (six months?), barring, of course, unforeseen circumstances such as illness. (2) They must be Christians without any shadow of partisanship, bitterness, nurtured resentments, or affectation in their lives. In other words, they must be stamped with integrity and with genuine love for other believers, not least the obstreperous ones. (3) They must not be gossips.

All of us would be wiser if we would resolve never to put people down, except on our prayer lists.

the wise father is more interested in a relationship with his son than in merely giving him things. Giving him things constitutes part of that relationship but certainly not all of it. The father and son may enjoy simply going out for walks together. Often the son will talk with his father not to obtain something, or even to find out something, but simply because he likes to be with him.

effective prayer is the fruit of a relationship with God, not a technique for acquiring blessings.

although public prayer is addressed to God, it is addressed to God while others are overhearing it.

public prayer ought to be the overflow of one’s private praying.

What they meant is that Christians should pray long enough and honestly enough, at a single session, to get past the feeling of formalism and unreality that attends not a little praying.

by and large, our thanksgiving seems to be tied rather tightly to our material well-being and comfort. The unvarnished truth is that what we most frequently give thanks for betrays what we most highly value. If a large percentage of our thanksgiving is for material prosperity, it is because we value material prosperity proportionately.

Succumbing to overreaction to too much emphasis on eschatology, many of us have jettisoned not only divisiveness over details, but interest in what is central.

can biblical spirituality long survive where Christians are not oriented to the world to come? And, in this context, can we expect to pray aright unless we are oriented to the world to come?

If we are grateful for the most important things, and determined to live with our eternal destiny uppermost in mind, what kinds of things will we pray for?

Paul wants us to become what we were not, and he prays to that end.

In a strange paradox, Paul is constantly telling people, in effect, to become what they are;

he is praying for them to the end that God will count them worthy of his calling.

That means we need to go over our own agendas and priorities, and those of the people and leaders in our churches and missions, and ask again and again, “What are our goals, our purposes? What is our mission, our direction? What should we be attempting, for Christ’s sake?” And as we find answers to such questions, we must intercede with God that he, by his great power, might bring these good purposes, these faith-prompted acts, to bountiful fruitfulness.

Having vision and is soon then praying for fruition.

Lying at the heart of all sin is the desire to be the center, to be like God. So if we take on Christian service, and think of such service as the vehicle that will make us central, we have paganized Christian service; we have domesticated Christian living and set it to servitude in a pagan cause.

Using Christian service as a means to our own glory is a pagan cause.

Our pilgrimage as Christians need not be very far advanced before we ruefully recognize that even our best service, motivated by the highest zeal, is regularly laced with large doses of vulgar self-interest.

When we glorify God, we are not giving him something substantial that he would not otherwise have. We are simply ascribing to him what is his.

Christian life can be lived faithfully only if it is lived in light of the end.

That vision must shape our prayers, so that the things that most concern us in prayer are those that concern the heart of God. Then we will persevere in our praying, until we reach the goal God himself has set for us.

The best Christian leaders will constantly assess all proposals—no matter how aesthetically pleasing or academically respectable—in terms of their power to serve people, not the other way around.

if we joyfully confess the lordship of Christ, then when we ask what is best for people our answers will be cast in terms of what he thinks is best for people, not necessarily what people think is best for themselves.

One of the remarkable characteristics of Paul’s prayers is the large proportion of space devoted to praying for others.

There are preachers who so loudly declare their love of preaching that it is unclear whether it is their own performance and their love of power that has captured them or their desire to minister to the men and women who listen to them.

His prayers for believers are nothing more than an extension of the same love that he bore them.

That means that if we are to improve our praying, we must strengthen our loving. As we grow in disciplined, self-sacrificing love, so we will grow in intercessory prayer. Superficially fervent prayers devoid of such love are finally phony, hollow, shallow.

he encourages Christians by telling them that he thanks God for his grace in their lives. Thus he has simultaneously drawn attention to the Thessalonians’ spiritual growth, thereby encouraging them, and insisted that God is the one to be thanked for it, thereby humbling them.

How much would our churches be transformed if each of us made it a practice to thank God for others and then to tell these others what it is about them that we thank God for?

So what we need, then, is a prayer life that thanks God for the people of God, and then tells the people of God what we thank God for.

in his regular times for prayer, day and night, he remembers the Thessalonians before the Lord.1 There are two lessons to learn: the importance of frequent, regular prayer times, and the importance of remembering the right things when we set out to pray.

For Paul, prayer is not a substitute for Christian service; it is part of it. And apparently he cannot long pray for believers without longing to serve them himself.

Conversely, we will see profound spiritual renovation if by God’s grace we make it our commitment not to put anyone down—except on our prayer list.

there is no prayer we can pray for others more fundamental than this: that God might strengthen their hearts so that they will be blameless and holy in the presence of our God and Father on the last day.

All praying presupposes an underlying theology; conversely, our theology will have a decisive influence on our praying. Of course, the direction of influence is not just one way: it is also true to say that our praying (or lack of praying) will also influence our theology.

Do all our petitions revolve around our own families and churches, our own cherished but rather small circle of friends?

Prayer is God’s appointed means for appropriating the blessings that are ours in Christ Jesus.

because of laziness and hedonism, people squander opportunities that the Lord graciously gives, Christians are to make the most of every opportunity, to avoid foolishness, and thus to show they understand what the Lord’s will is.

It is folly to pretend to seek God’s will for your life, in terms of a marriage partner or some form of Christian vocation, when there is no deep desire to pursue God’s will as he has already kindly revealed it.

That would be an immensely powerful plea in a shame culture. In the Western world, it is far too often taken as nothing more than one option. But in Paul’s world, to be a Christian, to confess Jesus as Lord, meant to adopt a world view in which you are bound to please him in every way. Not to do so would be to bring shame on him whom you have confessed as Lord.

If God had perceived that our greatest need was economic, he would have sent an economist. If he had perceived that our greatest need was entertainment, he would have sent us a comedian or an artist. If God had perceived that our greatest need was political stability, he would have sent us a politician. If he had perceived that our greatest need was health, he would have sent us a doctor. But he perceived that our greatest need involved our sin, our alienation from him, our profound rebellion, our death; and he sent us a Savior.