I Really Do Struggle With Prayer

thoughts on my convo with thomas oord (episode 113)

In the episode I pressed into prayer because prayer is a major struggle for me right now.

Major.

I mentioned to Thomas that when Dana’s godmother was diagnosed with COVID-19 … I don’t know. In the past I literally would have been on the phone building a prayer chain of people to storm the gates of heaven so that God would be moved to make her well as if God were sitting on the end of the bed, watching her being kept alive on a ventilator and waiting for just the right amount of people to pray so that he’d be inspired to use his healing powers to make her well.

But now? “Why bother?”, I wondered.

She ended up passing away of COVID, but even while she was still alive all I could think was, “why should I ask YOU to make her well? Why should I ask you to make her better? I mean, if you CAN make her well but you’re just choosing not to. Well. To be blunt, you’re a monster. And if you CAN’T make her well then at least we share a lot in common and perhaps we can just sit here and be miserable together.”

I know this all sounds a bit crazy, but I would sit down to pray and get so lost in my theology of what I believe about God and what I don’t believe and how I should pray or shouldn’t pray … I’d just end up praying nothing at all and leave feeling disappointed in both God and myself.

But I love the insight that Thomas brought me in this conversation.

First, though - a side note: I’m not yet 100% on board the “God Can’t Train”, if I’m being honest. I love Thomas, love the book, and love the whole concept … but I feel like it somehow silences a hopeful part of me that I don’t think I’m ready to let go of if that makes sense? It’s that part of me that doesn’t quite understand how God works, when God works, or why God works. And as much as I love the heart of “God Can’t” I almost feel like it answers too many questions for me and yet somehow leaves me with a ton more.

Wow, that was confusing, HA! Not sure. I’m still working through it all 😊.

But, even so, one of the biggest takeaways for me was the reminder that perhaps God needs cooperation and participation in order to act and so perhaps sometimes there are things going on at a molecular level that are beyond a human’s decision to cooperate that can thwart his efforts to work for our good.

I mean.

I don’t like that answer, to be honest, but I do think it’s better than the alternative, right? Having a God who CAN’T do something because there is lack of cooperation on some level is a lot easier to swallow than a God who CAN do something but sits in the corner and chooses to do nothing just because he’s God.

Because if the latter is true then, for example, God could have freed those 30+ children in Georgia who were being held as sex slaves (the youngest was 3 - THREE … my daughter is 3), but chose not to because it’s part of his will.

Gross. I don’t know what to do with that, to be honest.

And so when I have Thomas’s understanding of God in my head - that he’s always working on our behalf no matter what I see going on around me - it’s much easier for me to share with God what’s on my heart without overthinking my theology or whatever and know that no matter happens, he’s there and was there the whole time.

No matter how alone I feel, I’m not.

No matter how much it feels like he’s not working, he is.

AND.

I have a role to play, right? Thomas said in the episode that sometimes we need to pray along with the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. Before Jesus told Lazarus to come out, he told the people nearby to roll away the stone and once they did, that’s when the miracle happened.

The miracle happened.

AFTER.

The people rolled away the stone.

And so no matter how much it feels like there’s nothing I can do, perhaps there is always something I can do - perhaps there is always a stone that I can put my hands on to help move out of the way to make more room for the power of God to work in the situation.

The result?

Sometimes Lazarus might come out of the tomb or (in the case of Dana’s godmother) sometimes Lazarus might stay in the tomb, lifeless and cold … wrapped up in his grave clothes.

BUT.

Regardless of what happens, I can know that I’m not alone and as was true in the story of Lazarus, Jesus weeps with my loss … and maybe the constant realization of that never-ending connection to the Divine is what prayer really is at the most deep and intimate level?

I’m not sure. What I am sure of, though, is that prayer is hard these days. Heck, these days are hard!

Press on, friends. Much love,

• Glenn

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NEXT WEEK.

Next week we start our EIGHT WEEK SERIES on HELL called “TO HELL WITH HELL”. First up we’ll be talking to one of the top New Testament scholars in the galaxy, NT WRIGHT. He talks to us about the importance of background and context and helps us apply it to the topic of heaven, hell, and the Kingdom of God.

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