The Power of Prayer and Faith

by Ted Burleson

Prayer and faith are each a component in James’s recommendation for his readers. His admonition for believers to ask God for wisdom is his first reference to prayer (James 1:5). We must pray without doubt, or else our instability would mark our disbelief in the power of Almighty God. Regular prayer is counter-cultural but was very beneficial for ancient Christians as it still is for believers today.

In James 4:1–10, James teaches that God has many blessings that belong to Christians who will ask for them. We miss some benefits, because we never request them. We must pray according to God’s will and with proper motives. Wrong motives will result in the refusal of God’s blessings that are requested. James is not suggesting a way to manipulate God; instead, he recommends a disciplined practice that honors God and blesses believers.

Because God is the Father of Christians, we must have a personal relationship aided by a conversation with Him through prayer. We hinder our relationship with God if we conform to the standards of the world. James’s counter-cultural message is that instead of trying to please both parties in a dispute (worldly wisdom and heavenly wisdom), the Christian is to forsake the human model of success and depend upon God, aided by an active prayer life.

The counter-cultural message of James regarding prayer applies to contemporary society as much as ancient society. Worldly wisdom encourages us to “fit in,” while heavenly wisdom demands that we “stick out.”

Prayer rests the weary (James 5:13–20). The church elders are to represent the whole church and pray fervently for the sick while anointing them with oil. Prayer is that which heals. Prayer can improve not only the physical health of the ill but also the sin-sick by praying for forgiveness of sins. James encourages confession of sins to other Christians. Prayer for healing should follow this confession.

Prayer is counter-cultural in that secular culture sometimes scoffs at the power of prayer. When faced with trouble, depend on prayer to God to accompany the efforts of those who seek to heal us by conventional means. We should still call for the elders to pray for those in sickness, whether physical or spiritual.

Does God Have a Plan for You?
Jeremiah 29:11

Joel Stephen Williams

Debi Thomas tells about her encounter with Jeremiah 29:11 early in life: 

I was 17 years old when someone first gave me Jeremiah 29:11 as a gift: “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’” The verse was given to me in a greeting card when I finished high school. Four years later, I received it again as a college graduation present, this time in block letters on the cover of a prayer book. A year after that, my husband and I found the verse among our wedding gifts, penned in calligraphy and set in an elegant silver frame. For years, the frame hung on our living room wall.

“For I know the plans I have for you.” Or, to put it in language common to American evangelicalism, “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.” In the circles I grew up in, this “wonderful plan” was a core belief. As a Christian, I wasn’t simply saved, forgiven, and loved; I was held in the sovereign will of a God who ordained my comings and goings, my nights and my days. This meant nothing would happen to me—nothing could happen to me—outside God’s plan.*

Many Christians believe in the mythology of a special individual plan that God has for each person, even those who are not of a Reformed, Calvinist theological persuasion. Is this what Jeremiah 29:11 is suggesting? Let us take a closer look.

The prophet Jeremiah had sent a letter to the exiles in Babylon. In short, he tells them to settle down in Babylon, because it is going to be a long, seventy-year captivity (Jer. 29:10). They should not listen to prophets and diviners who are there in Babylon among them who are trying to deceive them, claiming they have had a dream from the Lord. It is a lie (Jer. 28:12–17; 29:8–9). These false prophets are promising a short captivity (Jer. 28:1–4, 10–11). If the Jewish people had listened to them and joined in a rebellion against Nebuchadnezzar, they would have been crushed. Jeremiah gives them a message from the Lord: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope” (Jer. 29:11). Jeremiah told the Jewish people that God would allow them to return to Jerusalem at the end of seventy years. This message was surely a disappointment to many people, because they knew they would not live that long or they would be too old to make the journey. But at least they knew that some of their children and grandchildren would be able to return one day.

Is Jeremiah 29:11 telling us that God has a special, individual plan for each person to follow? Are we to pray and to watch for signs from God, to try to read the spiritual tea leaves of life to discern what this special plan is for our life? To choose this job or that job? To go to this school or that school? To marry this person or that person? To buy this book or that book? Or, as someone told a friend of mine, to choose this item on the menu at a restaurant or that item? Hardly. In Jeremiah 29 we read about God’s sending a message to the whole nation of Judah through the prophet Jeremiah. We are not in a parallel situation today with living prophets delivering oracles to the whole church. Furthermore, neither is God sending private encoded messages – “God has laid it on my heart!”** “I feel like the Lord is leading me toward this decision!” “The Holy Spirit has revealed this to me!” — to individual Christians to guide them in daily decisions. It was God’s plan that the Israelites would be allowed to return from captivity after seventy years. It is an illegitimate interpretation of the biblical text to lift these words out of their context and to apply them the way it is frequently done in contemporary evangelical Christianity today.

How should ministers counsel and advise people who are seeking God’s will and direction in life? Here are a few suggestions.

• Instead of encouraging them to pray to God, seeking signs from heaven to show them which choice they should make between jobs, schools, or mates, point them to James 1:5 and help them pray for wisdom. Then help them discern God’s wisdom from the Scriptures. The book of Proverbs is full of wisdom as is the teaching of Jesus. For example, they should not make a decision primarily or solely on the basis of material gain. Every decision needs to include a person’s spiritual welfare.
• If they are attempting to discern God’s “plans” for them, in other words, the will of God for them, study the Scriptures with them about the will of God. God’s will is the same for all people. God desires that all would be saved in Christ (Eph. 1:11; 1 Tim. 2:4) and that we would live a sanctified Christian life (1 Thess. 4:3; 5:18). God’s will is that we would do what is right (1 Pet. 2:15; 3:17; 4:2, 19; Matt. 7:21). Everyone who has access to the message of the Scriptures can know this will of God, and this type of study will help a person make wise job choices, informed educational decisions, and hopefully find a good Christian mate.
• Study with people about planning for the future. Spiritual planning for the future as a Christian is not a matter of reading specially coded signs from heaven on what we are supposed to do each day. Instead, spiritual planning for the future is living “self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age” (Titus 2:12). We do not know what the future holds, so let us do what is right and say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that” (Jas. 4:13–17). One thing we do know is that the Lord will return, and there will be a judgment; therefore, we should plan for “these things” by living “lives of holiness and godliness” (1 Pet. 3:11).

I pray that these few simple suggestions will help you in your ministry with others. God bless.

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* Debie Thomas, “The Plan and the Dream,” The Christian Century 136, no. 14 (July 3, 2019): 35. Also recommended are the following: Garry Friesen, with J. Robin Maxson, Decision Making and the Will of God: A Biblical Alternative to the Traditional View (Portland, OR: Multnomah Press, 1980); and Jeffrey G. Sobosan, “The Illusion of Continuity,” Journal of Psychology & Theology 4, no. 1 (Winter 1976): 42–46.

**Some readers might question my point here by referring to God putting an idea in the heart of Nehemiah (Neh. 2:12; 7:5). This is not a parallel. Nehemiah was being led by the Lord on a divine mission to aid God’s people. For this reason, F. Charles Fensham, in his commentary, translates Nehemiah 2:12 as “I told no one what my God made clear to me to do for Jerusalem,” and Nehemiah 7:5 as “God inspired me to assemble the important citizens, leaders, and ordinary people” (Ezra and Nehemiah, NICOT, Eerdmans, 1982, pp. 164, 210). Some Bible translations give similar renderings. These translations should make us pause and consider the implications of anyone today using phrases like, “God laid it on my heart.” We are not a Nehemiah. We should follow his example and do the work of the Lord, imitating his courage, leadership ability, and moral integrity, but God has not inspired us nor called us specifically and directly to some grand mission like he did Nehemiah. Beware of those who claim divine sanction for their human plans.