Just as big a blockage to prayer as the losses of loved ones and failures of our authority figures are the myths that we are told in the religious culture about our ability to talk to God. Here are a few:
Myth 1: Prayer connects only when we ask God for the right thing.
The truth is that God initiates prayer-we don't. This is evident in Scripture. God spoke directly to an idol-worshiping, nomadic sheik named Abraham, led him to a new land and established a relationship with him through faith (Gen. 12, 13). The Bible records that God spoke to Moses as a man speaks with his friend (Ex. 33:11). Jesus told His disciples, "No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you" (John 15:15, 16, NKJV). Jesus says, "Listen! I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me" (Rev. 3:20, NRSV).
Our prayer is not the first step to Jesus. It is Jesus who stirs us to pray. Our prayer lets Him into our needs and permits Him to share the bread of life with us.
Myth 2: God communicates only with good people.
If God talks only to well-scrubbed, clear-thinking individuals who keep the Ten Commandments, then we all are in real trouble.
Consider this radical statement of Jesus to religious bootlickers: "You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of men, but God knows your hearts. What is highly valued among men is detestable in God's sight" (Luke 16:15). When the religious establishment criticized Jesus for eating with tax collectors and sinners, He replied, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy, not sacrifice.' For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners" (Matt. 9:12, 13).
What does this mean for prayer? It says that God loves desperate souls and that people in trouble have ready access to Him. It means that Jesus Christ identifies with our screwups and mistakes. The Bible tells us that Jesus sympathizes with our weaknesses and was "tempted in every way, just as we are-yet was without sin" (Heb. 4:15). That text concludes, "Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need" (verse 16).
When is your time of greatest need? When you're lonely, angry, hungry, tired, guilty, despairing, drunk, damaged . . . The Word of God says unequivocally that you can be confident in those moments to approach God through Jesus and receive His mercy and His grace to help you.
Myth 3: We have to know the right words to pray.
A little more than a year ago I was called by a friend, an administrator who had been devastatingly and treacherously betrayed, threatening his good reputation and career. He was upset beyond words. I told him to read Psalm 109 before he went to sleep that night. This prayer of David reads, in part, as follows:
"O God, whom I praise, do not remain silent, for wicked and deceitful men have opened their mouths against me; they have spoken against me with lying tongues. . . .
They repay me evil for good, and hatred for my friendship.
Appoint an evil man to oppose him; let an accuser stand at his right hand. . . .
May his days be few; may another take his place of leadership.
May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow.
May his children be wandering beggars; may they be driven from their ruined homes.
May a creditor seize all he has; may strangers plunder the fruits of his labor. . . .
But you, O Sovereign Lord, deal well with me for your name's sake; out of the goodness of your love, deliver me.
For I am poor and needy, and my heart is wounded within me"
(Ps. 109:1-22).
You may ask why a prayer such as this is even in the Bible. It's there for two reasons. It shows us that we can pray about anything, even when we are angry. Second, David did the best thing he could do with his anger-he put the problem squarely in God's hands. My friend told me the next day that this prayer helped save his spiritual life by allowing him to bring his feelings to God.
Myth 4: Be careful about what you ask God, because He may give it to you and you won't be able to handle it.
Jesus described God as a father who was wounded by an ungrateful son who took his inheritance early and squandered it all on sleazy sex and illicit substances. But when the son came home for a job, the father ran to him, welcomed him, forgave him, and, most incredible of all, threw a welcome-home party (Luke 15:11-32). Jesus said: "Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!" (Matt. 7:9-11, NRSV).
This is the God that Jesus Christ came to reveal. A Father who can't be compared to earthly parents, because in good times and bad, stress and failure, shame and rebellion, He just keeps on loving you, knowing that the only relationship that will mean anything in time and eternity is one based on loving response.
God's heart is great for us. It longs for us. He invites us to relationship-real, honest communion through prayer. No performance, no teaching, no tradition, no doctrine, no other commitment can substitute for a relationship with Christ.
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Kent A. Hansen is an attorney who lives in Corona, California.
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