What do we pray for? Acts 4:29-30

I spent a couple of hours between yesterday and today talking to a lady at the hospital who asked for a preacher. I had never met her before but she identified herself as a member of one of the other congregations in town and said that she was having trouble getting in touch with someone from there. It became very apparent as soon as we started talking that the reason she wanted to talk to a preacher was because she was very frustrated about a neighbor who was causing her trouble. I couldn't follow everything she said, but by the end of it, I was reading Jesus' instruction in the Sermon on the Mount about praying for your enemies and loving them even when they spitefully use you.

I'm still not sure if the message sank in. She insisted that she was praying that her neighbor would leave her alone and that she would be able to have peace. I tried to encourage her to pray a different way. To pray that God would actually bless her neighbor instead of just praying for peace through the situation and for her neighbor to mind her own business.

Praying for that kind of stuff when someone is doing us wrong just simply isn't easy. It cuts against our grain. And yet Jesus commanded it. I don't fault this lady for struggling with the idea. I do too. When I got back to the office and looked at the verse for today, this idea of what exactly it is that we are praying for hit me again.

The context of the passage above is that Peter and John had just been arrested twice and beaten once because they were speaking out in the name of Jesus. In fact, they had healed a man in the name of Jesus and refused to not give Jesus credit and preach in his name in the shadow of the healing. And after they were released, they went back to the other disciples and the disciples prayed this prayer. They knew persecution was coming, but they didn't pray for safety. They knew beatings were on the way and they didn't pray for protection. They knew it was going to be difficult and they didn't pray for an easier road.

They prayed that God would give them the strength to continue speaking in spite of the threats!

They prayed that God's power would be displayed through signs and wonders in the midst of the persecution!

I'm afraid that it is far too often that my prayers center completely on me and on my wants and desires. I try not to be selfish or self-centered, but I pray about the stuff that is worrying me and I ask God to take it away. Not so with the people who were this close to the death and resurrection of Christ. They understood in a very visible way the reality of the resurrection and the power of God. And therefore, they prayed that God's will would be done and that they would be enabled to do it. I want to have that heart! I want to have that abandon of personal protection and comfort and I want to be strengthened and emboldened to do and to say the things that God has called me to do and to say. And even though my personal wants usually bubble to the surface first, my deeper self...who I am at the core wants what God wants. Sometimes I just have to remind myself of that.

What do you pray for?

Do you pray that God would remove your obstacles or that He would give you the strength to overcome them?

Do you pray that God would give you the strength to overcome the obstacles that stand in your way or the obstacles that stand in the way of the advancement of the kingdom of God?

What do you pray for?

Perhaps when we evaluate our prayers we will see that we have not truly been obeying Jesus' instruction about prayer when he began his prayer with "Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." Maybe, if we start praying unselfishly as the early church did, we will start seeing more direct answers to prayers because we will truly be praying the will of the Father. Perhaps if we regain the passion for God's will to be done no matter the comfort or advancement of our own wills, we will get more passionate about saving souls than casting votes. More excited about winning lost sheep to Christ than winning ballgames. More serious about knowing the Savior of the World and making Him known to others than knowing the answers to the final exam.

What do we pray for?