Monday, October 16, 2006 AD
Praying like Elijah?
I was reading 1 Kings 18 this morning, the confrontation between Elijah and Baal on Mount Carmel. This led me to recall a helpful point made about this passage by Dick Lucas, in particular concerning verses 36 & 37.
Elijah has just set up his altar, and has poured water over it repeatedly, "so that the water ran all round the altar, and filled the trench also with water" (v.35). He then prays as follows:
The point Dick Lucas made was as follows. This text is often taken as an example of heroic prayer - "Elijah the Prayer-Warrior". Pouring water over the altar was Elijah's way of demonstrating his faith in God to be able to overcome even the most unpropitious of circumstances in response to our prayers. In the same way, we are to pray fervently and with faith, and not to be dismayed by the apparently impossible odds we may face. Indeed, we should avoid making human efforts to "help God along", because such efforts are a sign that we lack Elijah's faith in God to act against all adverse circumstances.
But Lucas then drew our attention to one little line from verse 36:
This puts a new perspective on our understanding of Elijah as an example for our own prayers (which he certainly is, as St James points out). But he is an example, not of someone boldly striking out on his own in his prayers and hoping that God will support him if he shows enough "faith", but instead of someone founding his prayers on the revelation of God.
Indeed, when we understand the story in this way, it reminds us what true faith is, and what it means to pray "in faith". The "prayer warrior" approach can encourage an equation of "faith" with personal fervency: so that to "have faith" is to have a certain inner mental/emotional state of certainty and confidence. However, true faith is simply believing and trusting what God has told us.
God said to Elijah, "Go to Carmel and challenge the prophets of Baal in the following way". This is what Elijah did; hence he was acting "in faith". Had it just been some idea Elijah had - an exercise in "holy risk-taking" - that would not have been acting in faith in quite the same way.
Similarly, for us to pray "in faith" is, first and foremost, to pray on the basis of what God has told us about himself and about his will and purpose for us. The Small Catechism's section on the Lord's Prayer is a good demonstration of this: for each petition, we are reminded that it is already God's purpose for his name to be hallowed, his kingdom to come, to give daily bread "to everyone without our prayers, even to all evil people", etc.
The point of this approach is not to say that our prayers don't matter, or that the only effect of prayer is to change our own perception of events and circumstances ("Prayer doesn't change God; it changes me"), but rather to spur us on to pray for these things with greater confidence; in other words, truly to pray like Elijah, confident that God will do what he has promised.
Elijah has just set up his altar, and has poured water over it repeatedly, "so that the water ran all round the altar, and filled the trench also with water" (v.35). He then prays as follows:
"O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your bidding. Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so that this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back."We are told that, in response to this prayer, "the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt-offering, the wood, the stones, and the dust, and even licked up the water that was in the trench" (v.38), leading the previously-unimpressed Israelites to fall on their faces crying, "The Lord indeed is God; the Lord indeed is God!" (v.39).
The point Dick Lucas made was as follows. This text is often taken as an example of heroic prayer - "Elijah the Prayer-Warrior". Pouring water over the altar was Elijah's way of demonstrating his faith in God to be able to overcome even the most unpropitious of circumstances in response to our prayers. In the same way, we are to pray fervently and with faith, and not to be dismayed by the apparently impossible odds we may face. Indeed, we should avoid making human efforts to "help God along", because such efforts are a sign that we lack Elijah's faith in God to act against all adverse circumstances.
But Lucas then drew our attention to one little line from verse 36:
"O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your bidding.Elijah wasn't "stepping out in faith" with a cunning plan of his own devising, and seeking to get God "on side" by demonstrating his own personal fervour. God had told him to do all this: from the challenge to the prophets of Baal to the pouring of water over the altar, everything Elijah had done in this chapter was at God's specific direction and bidding.
This puts a new perspective on our understanding of Elijah as an example for our own prayers (which he certainly is, as St James points out). But he is an example, not of someone boldly striking out on his own in his prayers and hoping that God will support him if he shows enough "faith", but instead of someone founding his prayers on the revelation of God.
Indeed, when we understand the story in this way, it reminds us what true faith is, and what it means to pray "in faith". The "prayer warrior" approach can encourage an equation of "faith" with personal fervency: so that to "have faith" is to have a certain inner mental/emotional state of certainty and confidence. However, true faith is simply believing and trusting what God has told us.
God said to Elijah, "Go to Carmel and challenge the prophets of Baal in the following way". This is what Elijah did; hence he was acting "in faith". Had it just been some idea Elijah had - an exercise in "holy risk-taking" - that would not have been acting in faith in quite the same way.
Similarly, for us to pray "in faith" is, first and foremost, to pray on the basis of what God has told us about himself and about his will and purpose for us. The Small Catechism's section on the Lord's Prayer is a good demonstration of this: for each petition, we are reminded that it is already God's purpose for his name to be hallowed, his kingdom to come, to give daily bread "to everyone without our prayers, even to all evil people", etc.
The point of this approach is not to say that our prayers don't matter, or that the only effect of prayer is to change our own perception of events and circumstances ("Prayer doesn't change God; it changes me"), but rather to spur us on to pray for these things with greater confidence; in other words, truly to pray like Elijah, confident that God will do what he has promised.
