A Different Understanding of Intercessory Prayer

A DIFFERENT UNDERSTANDING OF INTERCESSORY PRAYER Rev. Paul Wachdorf

“So I say to you, ‘Ask and you shall receive; seek and you shall find; knock and it shall be opened to you.’ For whoever asks, receives; whoever seeks, finds; whoever knocks is admitted. What father among you will give his son a snake if he asks for a fish, or hand him a scorpion if he asks for an egg? If you, with all your sins, know how to give your children good things, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.” (Luke 11: 9-13)

Jesus speaks to us about intercessory prayer. He tells us clearly of God’s intentions. God sincerely desires that we ask for what we want for ourselves, for others, and for our world. Intercessory prayer, then, is part of my journey of faith and yours as well, although our stories have a unique shape.

I would like to share a part of my own faith journey related to intercessory prayer. Perhaps it will prompt your own reflection on prayer in your life. I would like to trace a movement in my life from a childish and magical sense of intercessory prayer to a more spiritually mature and still growing appreciation of this prayer as an experience of personal transformation.

As a youngster, I grew up with a rather magical understanding of intercessory prayer. I fully believed that all I had to do was tell God what I wanted, and then I could step back and let God take over from there. Once I told God what I wanted, my responsibility ended, and God’s responsibility began. I fully believed that God was supposed to give me what I wanted, when I wanted it, no matter what I asked for. I had an image of God as a type of cosmic Santa Claus who distributed gifts and presents to those who asked for them.

Although I prayer, my experience was that more often than not I did not receive what I wanted, when I wanted it, or in the way I asked for it. This created a problem for me. Why would God tell me to ask for what I wanted if God was not going to give it to me? I received answers from people. Perhaps God said no. Perhaps I did not ask in the right way or for the right thing. Maybe I had been bad, and God does not grant the prayers of those who are bad. I was never satisfied with these reasons. It did not seem fair. I grew up feeling that I had never received satisfactory answers to my questions.

Sometimes I had a slightly different angle on intercessory prayer. I saw it as a bargaining chip. I prayer: “God, if you will only do this for me, then I will do that for you.” I can remember making promises to God that deep down I know I would not and could not keep. But I wanted to get what I wanted. Now I see these bargaining ploys as my attempts to control or manipulate God. They flowed from my rather grandiose belief that I knew what was best for me, for other people, and for the world. It was my way of saying to God: “My will be thine, and not thy will be done.” With age, reflection on my experience, and dialogue with other believers, I have arrived at a much different understanding of intercessory prayer. I still believe that God sincerely desires that we ask for what we want for ourselves, for others, and for our world. I also believe in miracles. I believe that every now and then, God does answer our intercessory prayers in miraculous and mysterious ways, ways we cannot predict or control. But now I understand that in the very act of asking for what I want from God, I experienced transformation. Through intercessory prayer, I come to experience God transforming my desires, my attitudes, and my behaviors.

First, intercessory prayer puts me in touch with my deepest desires. As I begin to express to God my desires, I come to realize that what I initially ask for is not always what I truly desire. I realize that I do not always know what is best for me, for others, and for the world. As I express my desires, they become purified, simplified, and deepened. I may begin by praying for health, wealth, success, fame, or fortune for myself or for others.

Over time I come to realize that what I really desire for myself and for others is a deep and intimate relationship with God and the gifts of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patient endurance, kindness, generosity, faith, mildness, and chastity (Galatians 5:22). My desires lead me to God. God gives the Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit to those who ask. Ultimately, this is what I truly desire. As I offer my prayers of intercession, I find that my desires become transformed.

Second, intercessory prayer puts me in touch with my radical dependence upon God. As I look at all that is wrong and needy in my life, in the lives of the people I pray for, and in the world, I realize that I am powerless. I cannot control people, places, or events. On my own, I cannot fix, rescue, or save myself, other people, or the world. When I offer my prayers of intercession, I acknowledge that I am powerless, that I cannot save the world, much less myself on my own. I turn over to the loving care of God all those people and things that I pray for.

That is not to say that I abrogate all responsibility for what I pray for. Rather, I do all that I can to bring about what I pray for, but ultimately I must turn the outcome over to God. The first three steps of Alcoholics Anonymous can be summarized in a way that expresses this very well: I can’t. God can. I’ll let God. Intercessory prayer is a confession of God’s grace at work in my life and in the world.

This letting go of control is a very humbling experience. I have to let go of my grandiose ideas about my own importance and my own ability to change people or the world. Intercessory prayer begins to transform my attitudes, helping me to place all things in the gracious hands of God.

Finally, I believe that God works in and through me to answer my own prayers. I become an instrument of God through whom my own prayers of intercession are answered. Every day when I pray morning prayer, I take time to expand the intercessions. I pray for people I know who are sick or suffering, for people who are struggling with some crisis, problem, or issue in their lives. As I offer these daily prayers, often I have experienced God inviting me to call, to visit, to write to the very people I am praying for. I have experienced God inviting me to be present to them, to listen, to support, to affirm, to walk with them. In my presence to and care for the people I am praying for, God has worked through me in surprising and mysterious ways to bring these people healing – emotional, mental, spiritual, and even physical. God has revealed to me what to say or how to be present to these people in ways that have answered my own prayers.

Another example: On a regular basis, I pray for the poor, the homeless, and the hungry of our world that they have their needs met. As I have made this prayer, I have felt God inviting me to set aside part of my income to donate to charities that work with the poor. I have felt God inviting me to help staff a shelter for the homeless in Chicago. I have felt God inviting me to live a simple lifestyle, so that I do not use more than my share of the world’s scarce resources. God has worked in and through me to answer my prayers for the poor. As I pray intercessory prayer, my behaviors are transformed.

I have come to understand intercessory prayer as an experience of transformation. Through it, I have let go of my trivial and superficial desires and learned what is really important, what I really desire. I have come to realize that I am ultimately powerless and radically dependent. I have no ultimate power and decisive control over the people. places, and events in my life. I do not even know what is best for the world and for myself.

I do what I can in the best way I can, but I must leave the ultimate outcome to God. God alone can do for me and for the world what I cannot do myself. I now know that I cannot simply present my prayers to God, step back, and be passive and uninvolved. My prayers of intercession draw me into greater commitment to and involvement with the lives of the people for whom I pray and in the world in which I live. God begins in mysterious ways to work in me and through me to bring about the very things I prayed for.

My more mature sense of intercessory prayer leaves me with something dangerous and risky. I cannot enter into it lightly. As I open myself up to the transforming power of intercessory prayer, I find that I get more than I bargained for. I find that God gives me what I want but in ways that surprise and challenge me. In the end, what I have learned is that intercessory prayer transforms me so that instead of changing the world through God, God changes the world through me.

Originally published in Praying, 115 East Armour Boulevard, P.O Box 419335, Kansas City, MO, 64111- 0335, September - October, 1994, No. 44, pp. 13-16.