A Praying Life
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19. Prayers do not happen in a vacuum, God is working a story and even our prayers for others should transform us
because he is a loving father, concerned with all aspects of our life
20. A Father’s Love. Earthly fathers imperfectly model our heavenly father, as we imperfectly seek the best for our children God perfectly seeks that which is best for us.
As a father who knows better than us, he may put us through difficult times for our good
21. Desert, God seeks to give us that which is best, which is himself. Putting us through the desert forces us to him rather than settling for the lesser things of the world.
Chapter 19 - Watching a story unfold
Our prayers are part of the larger work that God is doing in our lives and others lives.
Our Prayers Shape Us
Our Prayers Shape Us
God is doing more than answering prayers
We live in an era of the customer support desk
We have problem and we give the problem to the company support desk
the better ones provide a quick and adequate solution to our problem
The bad ones require us to pester them over and over till we finally get a manager
to return our defective Television
How astonished would we be if the manager decided it would be better for us to keep the defective television
How astonished would we be if the manager decided it would be better for us to keep the defective television
It
That yes, he could authorize a replacement but that it wouldn’t be in your best interest right now.
No, what we expect is for the manager to do everything to fix the problem as we see it.
Points in Book
Points in Book
Points in Book
although we might have a dialogue we never anticipate or accept that we ourselves may need change.
the last thing we want is to bring the support desk into our life
The goal, is that they will solve the problem and be out of our lives when they are no longer needed
We look at the problem as isolated from the rest of our life and we like it that way
isolated from the rest of our life and we like it that way
It is not like this with God
God is doing something much larger than answering prayers
With God
Our prayers are to change us (even if we are praying for change in others)
When we pray for other
Prayer should change how we see other people
to see them as people
With our children especially we can see their problems as things to fix
prayer shifts our view to see them as people that need to grow in faith
We want to see instant results
We should see our own sin
rather we should be patient in prayer as we
to pray for the sin in another life should expose the same in our own hearts
If we see sins in our children
It should reveal sins in our own hearts
Prayer in Parenting
Prayer in Parenting
God is doing more than Answering our prayers
Paul Miller notes that the importance of prayer in parenting is often understated
Prayer draws God into our lives
we believe that with the right principles and environment in place we can insure that our kids turn out right.
It changes the Prayer (or ought)
or we see that our children will is bent to evil we simply overpower their will with ours in the hope they will conform to us
even prays to change the heart of someone else ought to change us.
but the goal is not that our children conform to our will, it should be to see them in our heavenly fathers will
Praying for others hearts or sin issues
And we are completely incapable of changing our children hearts
We are to see them as a person, not a problem to be solved
We can do a lot to change the exterior
Not to be negligent in training our Children, but the cure for their heart cannot come from the parent
How the sins manifest themselves
Love informs our prayers, and our prayers shape how we love
But we cannot do the work of the heart necessary to purify our children from sin
Prayer relies on God to make a change, yet informs us how to enact our wills in subjection
I can see this strongly in my own parenting of my children
(Emily had a bent for the love of things, their response was to pray while removing temptations when possible)
Particularly some of our adopted children that arrived with some extremely bad habits
Prayers are to expose our own hearts
My children are lyers
It is never one way
In the early days I was bewildered by the lying because it had become so pervasive that my children lied even when it didn't’ help them
If our prayers our genuine for another persons sin, we should be convicted of the same
Most children start lying to get out of trouble or to get something they want
Prayers are always two way
With mine it had become such a part of their life that they barely considered telling the truth
even If we are speaking to God about someone else, there is likely something we are to grow in
And although their lying is much less now, they are still little lyers
Prayers exist in the Larger Story of what God is doing
they no longer lie in every situation as a matter of habit
in our lives
Our discipline has changed their behavior
in others lives
but the root sin in the heart is unchanged
Parenting and Prayer
Parenting and Prayer
I have seen something similar with the Anger in Leyiah
Creating the perfect environment is not sufficient to remedy the problem of sin in our children
As parents we cannot change our children’s hearts
We change the child by dominating his/her will
we don’t carry the power to defeat sin
We must be convinced that we parents cannot change our children's hearts
Son on the one hand Paul Miller says parents error in thinking they themselves can change their children’s hearts
We fail to repent of our sins in the face of our children’s sins
But the error in the other direction is to say they will never change
Self-willed children
We have moved to an extremely passive parenting
My child is what he is and so we might as well get used to it.
self-willed
We make excuses for the child behavior since we are hopeless it can change
Angry
Modern psychology fuels this
Paul miller categorizes the two approaches as Despair & Demanding
Deceptive
The demanding parent sees the control in their own hands
“I have the power, I am in control”
The focus is on the other person and how they need to change
It also seems that we become the standard when this is our model
Role of prayer is simply one more weapon in the toolbelt
The parent who has given in to despair
NO power, completely out of conrol
Focus on how the other person can’t change
Prayer has no role as I've given up
UNTIL YOU ARE CONVINCED YOU CAN’T CHANGE YOUR CHILD’S HEART, YOU WILL NOT TAKE PRAYER SERIOUSLY.
OR I can’t do anything about their before so I should give up on hope of it changing
What Paul Miller refers to as “Good Asking” is the prayer centered model
Passive parenting
here, we see God as having the power and being in control.
Nothing seems to work and so hope of change is diminished
The focus is not on the other person but on God and his presence and starting with my own need to change in light of that
“UNTIL YOU ARE CONVINCED THAT YOU CAN’T CHANGE YOUR CHILD’S HEART, YOU WILL NOT TAKE PRAYER SERIOUSLY”
The role of prayer is central, asking God to do a work and surrendering to it
If you are on the road of Good Asking, you have also given up- but in a good way. You’ve given up on your ability to change other people. Instead, you cling to God and watch him weave his story.
When we “give up” we are not giving up that a person will change, we are giving up on our ability to change them
Both of these wrong attitudes have a low view of God’s power
Goals for our child is to be attached to our child’s faith, not accomplishments.
Ch. 20.
Ch. 21
Guatemala
Guatemala
“Was this a name-it-and-claim-it prayer? No, it was actually a powerless prayer. I prayed because I was weak. I wasn’t trying to control God. I certainly wasn’t in control of Emily. I was simply praying God’s own heart back to him. I couldn’t imagine him not answering such a prayer.
But remaining fully confident in God’s abliity
and meanwhile being changed ourselves so we are better able to see and nurture the work God is doing in their life
“My two prayer requests - for her relationships with her earthly father and her heavenly Father - were closely connected a breakthrough in one led to a breakthrough in another. As I watch God’s stories unfold, I watch for His little design touches, His poetry.”
The most noticeable difference from the Demanding model and Good Asking is in the kind of change we are hoping to see
God had delayed the answer to the prayer for 5 years, but His timing and manner were perfect.
As demanding parents we may start off with what we say is a desire to see our children grow more Christlike
but the truth is that the priorities are our priorities and not Gods
Broken Images of God
Broken Images of God
We are fallen broken images of God our Father. We know when a father is flawed, we know how a true father should love.
We begin to spend more time and more resources trying to change things that personally irk us or annoy us than to see our children grow in faith
Ch. 21 Unanswered Prayer
How have you seen this play out in your own life? Do you feel that your parenting is an outflow of your own obedience to your heavenly father or a desire to change your children into your own image?
Understanding the Patterns of Story
Understanding the Patterns of Story
Do we look to see the story that God is unfolding through our prayers?
God Our father
God Our father
Jill had prayed daily for the protection of her daughter
As parents, we understand that things take time
Her daughter, Kim, was born with lots of problems
We would like our children to have good jobs
but we understand that our 3 yr. old lacks the proper skills to secure a good job
and we understand that as life unfolds for our children the opportunities to grow and develop those skills will come
We understand that just because our 4yr daugher is carrying her baby-doll by the neck does not mean she is going to be a failure as a mommy.
Yet often we become impatient with God
Why hasn’t he fixed this problem yet
But as our heavenly father , he is working things out in their proper timing
developing us, others, and our children according to his perfect timeframe
When God delays an answer to prayer, it is his love as our Father
As parents, we understand that our children do not know what is best for themselves
Problems and disorders continued
Our children often ask for things that we do not believe is best for them
As loving parents, we give them what we believe is best for them
If we give in simply because we are sick of the whining
then we are actually loving ourselves more than our children
We want peace and quiet, and we are willing to withhold the best from our children to get what we want
But although we may frequently fail to do what is best for our children
Due to ignorance
selfishness
lack of resources
We know our heavenly father has no such limitations
He always knows what is best for us
There is nothing he has withheld from us, he has given up himself for us
He is God and has all resources at his disposal
So if God is keeping something we desire from us, it is for our Good
perhaps we simply are not ready for it
My wife tells me that for years she desired to be married
Yet God had kept her from any such relationship
but it wasn’t until she was finally broken and gave up the ideal of being a wife and mother,
but it wasn’t until she was finally broken and gave up the ideal of being a wife and mother,
that a week later I was interested in her and we started dating and married within 7 months
Perhaps the thing we want is not actually good for us
We might desire a certain career path
and God keeps us from it knowing it would draw us away
or a certain person as our spouse
But God knows that person would be a terrible helper
As parents, we know that discipline and hardship can be good for our children
She prayed for her daughter to be safe from harm
In the book, Paul relates the story of his daughter being benched for an entire season of field hockey
yet her daughter was a harmed child
He didn’t like seeing the hardship but he also recognized that it would do more to grow and mature her faith than success.
There becomes a divide between Hope and Reality
So if we know these things as parents to our children
The Desert
Coping with the Gap
Coping with the Gap
And we know that God is a far more capable and loving Father
Denial - doesn’t face reality. Insist God has healed yet die from Cancer
Determination - Make it happen through any means possible
Money, time, other people, prayer
Despair - Give up on hope, it is what it is and will not get better
We know that we can trust him through the hard times
Example: Abraham lived in reality, knew he was without an heir
How has a flawed imperfect father helped you to see the perfect love of our true heavenly father?
But still believed and had hope in the promise
The Desert
The Desert
Sarah tried determination to bring reality up to the hope with Hagar
Unanswered Prayer
The Desert
Understanding God as our Loving Father is critical to understanding why God does not always answer prayer
Most biblical figures had times in the desert
God is not a disconnected help desk worker trying to fix your problem so you will go
Abraham, Joseph, Moses, the Israelites, David, Elijah, Jeremiah, Hezekiah, Jesus, Peter
He is a loving Father and every part of your life is being worked out for your good
God’s
Life in the desert
Paul Miller tells us that prior to their Daughter Kim’s birth, Jill prayed continually that God keep her baby from harm
We do not know when it will end (The Israelites were days from the promised land for 40 years)
The prayer she prayed was , a psalm of God’s promise to keep his people from harm
What she was praying was not simply her own desires, she was praying to God for that which he himself had promised
The experience is customized for all of us
The result was a child born with severe disabilities
The heart of the desert experience is the Father turning his face away (at least seemingly)
Thriving in the Desert
Jill had Hope in a promise that her daughter be kept from harm
All God’s children are taken through the desert.
It is a cure for our wandering hearts
It breaks our wills, we stop fighting
The things (other than God) for which we live life start to die.
Our idols are starved
It brings a sense of helplessness
This is crucial to the spirit of Prayer
Face to face with our own inability to live
Have joy
do anything of value
Life is crushing
The suffering burns away false selves of cynicism, pride or lust
It changes us, often without us noticing
things that were important fade
The true thirst is revealed
A thirst for God
We cry out to God so often that the window of communication blossoms
God’s gift through the desert is his own presence
“You cry out to God so long and so often that a channel begins to open up between you and God?
The desert Blossoms
Example: the humbling experience of raising Kim
The hard times pushed the family closer to Christ
Kept from Harm
God answered the prayer in a larger way although it seemed like the prayer had gone unaswered.
God had protected them more from harm by allowing Kim to be disabled.
God does act on our behalf in prayer, weaving his story.
2 Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.
:
To be watchful keeps us looking for how God is unfolding his promises
Thankfulness that everything we receive is a gift.
But the reality was a daughter that had been badly harmed from birth
The resulting divide between hope and reality is what we will call the desert
So what do we do when the reality of our situation is far from that in which we have hope? Perhaps it even seems to be moving further away from hope.
The tension between hope and reality is unpleasant
We desire to fix it
Sometimes we have a number of coping mechanisms to try to resolve the problem ourselves.
som
One such wrong method is Denial
We simply alter our perception of reality align with our hope
Believing we have been cured of cancer while it continues to destroy our body
insist a child has been born again when they are obviously living for the world
Another is shear force of will or determination
I WILL FIX THIS
I will use all my resources to change my reality
But the truth of the matter is that if God intends us to be in the desert we will not be able to take ourselves out
The Israelites spent 40 years in the desert despite only being a matter of days walking from the promised land
Lastly, we may turn to despair and give up on Hope
The other thing
Have you ever found yourself trying to resolve the tension between hope and reality by resorting to denial, determination, or despair?
Learning to live in hope despite circumstances
We have many examples of those who lived in hope despite circumstances
Abraham lived in the reality of his old age and Sarah’s barrenness
Yet he also lived in hope
18 In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.”
Romans
iii. not that he always did it perfectly
He and Sarah try to close the gap themselves when Sarah offers Hagar
Sarah had also given up hope that she would conceive,
she laughed when the Angels said she would conceive in a year
David lived years with the promise that he would be king
yet the reality was he was a hunted fugitive running from his life
David had the opportunity to change the reality himself
Saul twice was given into his hand
Had David killed Saul he could have had a clear path to the crown
But he would not sin by killing God’s anointed
He held on to the Hope that God would fulfill His promise without him sinning
God takes all he loves through the Desert experience
Because he is a loving father that knows what is best
But the experience is unique for all of us. He gives each of us individually what is best
He desires for us to grow and mature
It cures our wandering souls
it is easy to find satisfaction in the world when things are going well
The desert experience starves our worldly idols
We find ourselves unable to be satisfieds
Life in the desert
We do not know when it will end (The Israelites were days from the promised land for 40 years)
The experience is customized for all of us
Thriving in the Desert
Thriving in the Desert
All God’s children are taken through the desert.
It is a cure for our wandering hearts
It breaks our wills, we stop fighting
The things (other than God) for which we live life start to die.
Our idols are starved
It brings a sense of helplessness
This is crucial to the spirit of Prayer
Face to face with our own inability to live
Have joy
do anything of value
Life is crushing
The suffering burns away false selves of cynicism, pride or lust
It changes us, often without us noticing
things that were important fade
The true thirst is revealed
A thirst for God
We cry out to God so often that the window of communication blossoms
God’s gift through the desert is his own presence
“You cry out to God so long and so often that a channel begins to open up between you and God?
The desert Blossoms
Example: the humbling experience of raising Kim
The hard times pushed the family closer to Christ
Kept from Harm
God answered the prayer in a larger way although it seemed like the prayer had gone unaswered.
God had protected them more from harm by allowing Kim to be disabled.
God does act on our behalf in prayer, weaving his story.
ESV
2 Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.
To be watchful keeps us looking for how God is unfolding his promises
Thankfulness that everything we receive is a gift.