How’s your prayer life? That might seem like a tough question to answer at first glance unless, of course, we get to the heart of the matter. There’s more to your prayer life than just folded hands or closed eyes. There’s more to your prayer life than just the right sounding words.
In theory, we’re taught that our prayers should start off on a high note: praising and adoring God. That’s right and proper. But in practice we often see something else. Take Jeremiah’s prayer for instance. In theory, Jeremiah should have started with some note of praise. But in practicality, and in truth, the most praise he could muster was to call upon God as the LORD, and give his grievance. Let’s take a look at Jeremiah’s prayer. We’ll consider it under the theme: PRAY REALISTICALLY. Realistic prayer often begins with 1) complaint. Yet, the Lord moves It moves into 2) confidence.
1) Often With Complaining
O LORD, you deceived me, and I was deceived; you overpowered me and prevailed. I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me. That’s the opening line of Jeremiah’s prayer. Jeremiah calls upon the faithful God, but he says that he was duped, as if God pulled the wool over his eyes. He thought God had promised him a “rose garden” ministry. And Jeremiah complains that he bought into it. He complains that he had ever said, “Yes, Lord, send me!” Well, in a manner of speaking, serving the LORD in the ministry is a rose garden: to have a lovely bed of roses, you end up taking more than your share of pricks from the thorns.
Jeremiah had many weeds to pull: he would be preaching much of God’s Holy Law to expose sin, and to condemn it. He had just gotten out of jail, after being flogged for proclaiming the truth: God was sending Judah into captivity for seventy years because of their sins. And so, the result was that he was ridiculed all day long. Everyone mocked him.
He was not exaggerating, as many do when they have a bad day. His enemies were whispering about him: I hear many whispering, “Terror on every side! Report him! Let’s report him!” His so-called friends were just waiting for him to fail. All my friends are waiting for me to slip, saying, “Perhaps he will be deceived; then we will prevail over him and take our revenge on him.”
Why this mockery? He was proclaiming God’s word. He was denouncing the evil deeds of his people: their violence. He was proclaiming what the results of their sins would be, unless they would repent: destruction. Even when he tried holding back, he could not. Because it was God’s word, not his. Whenever I speak, I cry out proclaiming violence and destruction. So the word of the LORD has brought me insult and reproach all day long. But if I say, “I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,” his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot.
Let’s take a moment now, to learn from these words. Think back on your prayer life. None of us are Jeremiah: but as Christians, it shouldn’t be too hard for us to find a few things in common with this prophet. How many of your prayers, how many of my prayers, start out with something like “Lord, what happened to your promises? Where are you, in all of this? How is THIS working for ‘my good’”? How many of our prayers, start out with a hot complaint against God and against what he has done in our lives?
Did you happen to catch some of the faulty thinking on Jeremiah’s part? Jeremiah complains to God, as if it’s God’s fault that his message was not being listened to, and that Jeremiah was being mocked for preaching God’s Word. The cause for all the trouble was the hard as stone hearts of those to whom Jeremiah preached. The hardest of them were the very priests at the temple, and the kings and nobles who shepherded God’s people. That’s where the strongest persecution came. But that’s why God sent Jeremiah to them: to break their hard hearts! Jeremiah was complaining as if things WERE NOT working out right; but according to God’s schedule, everything was going as planned.
Point being: most of the complaints in our prayers are aimed against the wrong parties. This happens because we don’t know exactly how God’s plan is SUPPOSED to work. Sometimes, we pray with complaints against God, sometimes against ourselves, sometimes against others. The blessed thing about prayer, even our faulty prayers and complaints, is that we take them to God. He often answers our prayers just to correct our faulty thinking, so that we see things in the right way: that we realize we have no real reason to worry in the first place.
Everyone has complaints. But there is a big difference between complaining ABOUT God, and complaining TO God. The world is full of people who complain about God: even atheists complain about God. They don’t believe he exists, but they’ll complain about him anyway. But a heart that has been cleansed by faith complains TO God. Despite our concerns, doubts, despair, we desire to “call upon Him in the day of trouble.” We long to cast all our anxiety on him, because we know he cares for us. As long as we are sinners, our complaints will never truly be GOOD and RIGHT: but at least we can take them to the RIGHT PLACE, to the RIGHT PERSON. To the LORD, who loved us and gave His own Son for us!
2) Always With Confidence
He is not shocked with our complaints. God has forgiven and forgotten more blasphemous complaints than you or I could ever utter. He has heard no new complaints, just rehashes of the old ones. Jesus died for all those sins: don’t be afraid, therefore, to come to God with your complaints. He can do something about them: either by delivering us from a true complaint, or by changing our perspective, so that we see we really don’t have any reason to worry nor complain in the first place. So next time you have a complaint against God, go to Him with it: He knows exactly what you’re thinking already—you may as well bring it to Him. He’s got ears; He’s got a mouth. He’s promised to answer all who call upon Him in truth.” If there is ONE GOOD THING we can learn from Jeremiah and his complaint, it is how patient and caring our God really is: He will actually listen to our complaints, bogus or otherwise. And he will answer them. Practical prayer often begins with complaint. But the Holy Spirit will not leave it in that bad place. He moves it on into confidence.
Jeremiah’s prayer began with despair and complaint. But the Holy Spirit moved him into confidence. It wasn’t confidence in how things looked. It wasn’t confidence in Jeremiah’s own ability. It was confidence in the LORD. But the LORD is with me like a mighty warrior; so my persecutors will stumble and not prevail. They will fail and be thoroughly disgraced; their dishonor will never be forgotten.
Jeremiah knew himself as “needy” and weak. He knew the LORD, the faithful God, the God who defended His people against the armies of Pharaoh, who led Israel into battle, who brought down Goliath before the shepherd boy, David. That’s where any confidence we have in prayer comes from: not from who we are, but from who our God, our Savior, is. Jeremiah’s enemies were greater than he: but they were not greater than the LORD, the God who has mercy on whom he has mercy.
The LORD is not one who will make a wrong decision, because he doesn’t have all the facts. The LORD is one who looks down, probes, and examines hearts, minds, and motives. To the LORD Almighty, you who examine the righteous and probe the heart and mind, Jeremiah prays. What comfort for us, also, when praying in times of trouble. What often troubles us the most is that we don’t know what someone else is thinking about us. It’s usually what people don’t know or didn’t know about each other that causes the biggest stress on a relationship. In Jeremiah’s trouble, especially with friends who whispered about getting revenge on him, he had no idea what was going on in their hearts and minds. He heard their words: that was all he could go on. And they were not good words. Yet, he was not sure what was best. He could not read their hearts. But he knew someone who could see what those people were thinking, and where their hearts were. And so, he calls upon the LORD to deal with them.
His prayer sounds like something we should never pray for, but Jeremiah prays, “let me see your vengeance upon them, for to you I have committed my cause. Jeremiah knew something about the LORD, something which we often forget, and that’s this: God will not be mocked. If Jeremiah truly was preaching God’s word, and people mocked him for it, then they were truly mocking God. If Jeremiah was given God’s Word to preach, so that souls are saved eternally, then those who opposed him were actually opposing God’s will. And God would not stand for it.
God moved Jeremiah from complaint to confidence: all in one prayer. Prayer is not a means of grace, but it is helpful medicine, one that never fails. See if God, by His Spirit, doesn’t do the same in your prayer life. Turn your complaints to confidence in Your Savior, as he brings you from asking “God, why have you forsaken me,” to admitting, “O Lord, what was I worried about in the first place?”
Don’t leave off on a prayer, especially a heartfelt complaint, until the LORD leads you to confident trust. If you don’t have time to finish praying for such a thing, leave it alone for a while, and go back to it. But once the LORD stirs you to confidence in your prayers, well, that’s the best time to say “Amen.” Because you know it will be so. Amen and amen.
