The Envelope, Please

Then he said to me, “Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand and humbled yourself before your God, your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words.  The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days, but Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, for I was left there with the kings of Persia, and came to make you understand what is to happen to your people in the latter days. For the vision is for days yet to come.” – Daniel 10:12-14

Through his study of the writings of the prophets before him, Daniel was given understanding of the times and of the deliverance of his people from exile to return to Jerusalem.  Even though it was prophesied, Daniel prayed, confessing his sins and the sins of his nation, and asking that God’s will might be done according to the revelation given. 

In the film, Lawrence of Arabia, Lawrence famously counters the fatalistic determinism of his Mohammedan allies by saying, “Nothing is written.”  God does have a will, and the Son has called us to pray that the will of the Father be done.  We cannot be fatalists for we are the instruments of the Divine will.  Lawrence’s statement goes to the other extreme, exalting the will of man and making him the measure of all things.  

 Man can do what he wants, but he cannot change the truth.  The will of God is the truth.  To ignore it or defy it is to be broken by it.  To align ourselves with truth and reality, we must take in the sails of our own desires, fears, emotions, and insecurities that the fickle winds of worldly thinking might not seize control of our lives to overthrow us and sink us in the depths or cast us shattered upon the rocks and reefs.   

From the moment Daniel began to pray, he was heard.  There is often opposition and resistance that must be broken down in order for an answer to reach us.  As was the case with Daniel, the answer is not always as much an immediate manifestation as a confirmation or assurance.  God tells us, “You’ve got it.”  For us, much of the time, what impedes this assurance is not “a prince of the kingdom”, some dark external power, but our guilt, our lack of faith, and the contrary desires of our own fleshly thinking. 

I’m not sure there’s a lot we can do to assist warring angels in their battles.  For our guilt, though, we have the justification of the Cross.  If we need faith, it comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.  As Daniel’s faith came from reading Moses, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, our faith is quickened and fortified as we study the Scriptures.  Putting aside the obstacle of my own will can be the roughest and most trying part of prayer as it is often bulwarked with rationalizations, dread of loss, and pride.  The discipline of persistent prayer aids us in breaking through this last barrier from our side. 

One thing about persistent prayer where I think there is sometimes a misunderstanding -- at least, I had a misunderstanding:  importune intercession is not necessarily long.  When some people pray, they seem to be making a case with God.  When Jesus taught us to pray to our Father in heaven, He did not urge us to use many words or to plead exhaustively.  In the illustration Jesus gave us of the persistent widow and the unjust judge in Luke 18, the plaintiff simply says, “Give me justice against my adversary.”  She knew her rights.  She knew the law, but she didn’t spend an hour giving the details.  Sometimes, “Help!” is all we need to say. 

Also, we should not be confused by the translation of Matthew 6:7 from the King James Version:  But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do:  for they think they shall be heard for their much speaking.  

The ESV gives a clearer understanding:  And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words.  Don’t be afraid to pray often and repeatedly for the same thing.  Our job is to ask God to do His will – which is always the right, lawful and good thing that is needed.  It is not to nag Him into doing what we want or to win a debate with Him and convince Him to change His mind. 

God is our Father and our Sovereign Lord.  If His will is done, we are happy.

How Do You Do?

Actions, then, are called just and temperate when they are such as the just or the temperate man would do; but it is not the man who does these that is just and temperate, but the man who also does them as just and temperate men do them. -- Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics

Slaves, obey your earthly masters  with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man, knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free. -- Ephesians 6:5-8

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. -- 1 Corinthians 10:31

Doing good should, I suppose, ideally arise from being good.  Being, though, can be honed by practice.  It seems we used to understand this better than we do today. 

We can do much good deceptively, to gain an advantage, to convince others that we are better or other than we are.  Sometimes we may even convince ourselves.  Thus both Paul and Aristotle point out the importance of the intentions and motives that underlie our actions.  Intentions are not feelings.  My actions count.  My motives count.  My emotions, not so much.  I may feel like doing the right thing, or I may not.  I should do it anyway.

Whatever we do, we can do it to the glory of God.  That is, we can do it as Jesus — who was certainly just and temperate, merciful and gracious and true -- would, i.e., for the same reasons.  The question is not, then, what Jesus would do, but how and why.  Imitating Christ is good; however, it means imitating Him at a level beyond pious behavior.

To put what He said in words I might be able to understand, Jesus was always looking outside for need and inside for direction and authority.  I am apt to turn it wrong-side out, look inward at my own needs and wants while looking outside for someone or something to fix me.  By looking inside for authority, we mean looking spirit-ward, away from the physical strength and resources we might bring to bear and toward, as Jesus said, what we see our Father doing. 

Our authority and power to act righteously comes from what is done above — as God's will is done in heaven, we replicate that on earth.  As I often must remind myself, prayer is not about getting my way so much as it is about getting a look at His way.  One mistake I have made in the past, even understanding that truth about prayer, is that I held an expectation of some vast, detailed, all-encompassing vision or revelation.  That can happen, I suppose, but it's more like finding out what frequency God is broadcasting on today and tuning my receiver to pick it.  The message won't come through until its time, but, if I'm not on the right channel, I'm likely to miss it.