Power In Prayer, or Not!

Scripture

Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results.

~James 5:16 NLT

Quote

If God cannot be moved by our praying then He is only pretending to answer our prayers because He is doing what He intended to do all along.

~Dallas Willard {The Divine Conspiracy}

I can’t count the number of times that I have heard want to be theologians say, “Prayer doesn’t change God; it can only change man.” I always shutter when I hear this said and think, “Where on earth did this idea come from?” The idea that everything would happen exactly as it does regardless to whether or not we pray is ridiculous. This would make intercession psychologically impossible: prayer would be nothing but dead ritual which is something that God despises. There is more theology in Luke 15 than in all the books ever penned by mortals. Our heavenly Father is a good, good, Father just like the one in Luke 15. Jesus said, “If you earthy fathers {being evil as you are} know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more with the HEAVENLY FATHER give good gift to those who asks Him. Do earthly fathers give good gifts? Does it make a difference when their children ask?

There are several stories in the OT that illustrate my point: God told Moses that He was about to destroy the Israelites and start all over with Moses. Moses interceded passionately begging God to spare them. Exodus 32:14 reads, So the Lord changed his mind about the terrible disaster he had threatened to bring on his people. In Genesis 6 we find these words, The Lord observed the extent of human wickedness on the earth, and he saw that everything they thought or imagined was consistently and totally evil. So the Lord was sorry he had ever made them and put them on the earth. It broke his heart. You prefer the King James, it says “It repented the LORD that He had made man.” There is also the case of Hezekiah whose Prayer influenced God to turn Isaiah around and go back to the kings bedroom with good news…“God will give you an extension on life.” Then there is Abraham’s intercession for Lot and Sodom. You can argue that prayer has no influence on God but not based on scripture. This theology that presents God as a stern, belligerent Deity who sits on a throne with an unblinking cosmic stare and is never touched by our infirmities is false.

Of course the intellects will raise the question: How can an omniscient God be influenced by our prayers. He knows everything including the future so how does this prayer thing work? I don’t know how it works and neither does anyone else. I don’t understand electricity completely but I know there is power in it and I know how to flip a switch. Relax and let God take care of the mysteries; just be obedient to His word which commands us to ask. Anytime intellect takes precedent over faith, we are digressing.

God is good all the time. What about this heat wave? The great thing about 28 degree weather is that it makes 45 degree weather feel great.

Don’t forget to pray for our President: the wicked are in hot pursuit, pray that they fall into the pit they are digging for Trump. Stock fell on Mark Ingram who blamed the Alabama lost on Trump. One word for this less than intelligent statement: Unbelievable! Alabama lost because they made critical mistakes against a very good opponent.

Bill and Carol Southern {Salt of the earth people} carried June and I to Sweet Peppers in Cullman yesterday: I had chili and a sandwich; June had a bread bowl of potato soup and both were delicious. They have deli’s across the street from one another: Sweet Peppers on the West side and Newts on the East side. Bill highly recommends both.

Deidra and Soy will be here soon: they will be at GRACE POINT on November 24. We are looking forward to their visit.

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