I think in the last year we’ve learned much about what it means to pray. True enough most of our prayers are for healing and comfort but we certainly have been learning to pray by practicing I think. But praying, by definition is speaking to God, worshiping God, Thanking God, or imploring God to do something different than what is going on.
Two weeks ago (Sunday, August 01, 2004) someone in the Tampa Florida City Council invited Michael Harvey to open their meeting with “prayer”. (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,127614,00.html “Atheist Invocation Sparks Outrage”)
The only problem is that Mr. Harvey is an atheist. One can very easily imagine that Mr. Harvey didn’t pray, he scolded the council for praying to what he called "invisible men in the sky." I can’t imagine why; but several of the city council members got angry at Mr. Harvey for being consistent with his lack of faith and “a debate continued for nearly 30 minutes until three members walked out.” Now before you side with the Tampa council on this, consider two things. 1) Someone on the council invited him. 2) Michael Harvey was indeed being consistent. (May God lead him to repentance!).“Harvey doesn’t believe in God so praying for civic wisdom for public servants, the whole idea behind any invocation, was impossible.” Luis Lugo of the Pew Forum on Religious and Public Life quipped, "It doesn’t make any sense to be praying in essence to ’’whom it may concern.’" I would agree.
By God’s grace alone by the way, we possess faith in Him, and therefore we run to him in prayer. He is not some “invisible man in the sky” he is the ever present; all powerful; holy; and by grace, approachable creator, owner and Lord of the universe. His power is not limited and his authority is absolute – that is to say, that God is sovereign.
But it nearly begs the question a bit, if God is sovereign, why does he ask us to pray in these many terms? If God responds to our prayers, does that mean that he somehow changes his plans? Can we infer from the scriptures that God creates wickedness to bring about his plans? I believe in tonight’s text we find the answer to these questions and in a rather unique passage we get to witness The Divine Interplay of Prayer in God’s Unfolding Plan. Fact is, it won’t answer all our questions about prayer, but we can see demonstrated here, (1) the faithfulness of God in answering prayer in the past, (2) how God expects prayer to bring about not just changes but even the unfolding of his revealed will, How God answers prayer, as well as the sovereignty of God’s choice being affected before works or prayer are ever uttered – and yet somehow in a mystery God’s revealed will, his perfect will and his permissive will combine to bring about the unfolding of his plan through the frail – and frequently failed labors of his humble subjects; all to the praise of his glory and grace... Give God the Glory; Say praise the Lord!
Fitting all these pieces together is perhaps a somewhat familiar text in Genesis Chapter 25:19-34. Historically speaking the text ties together the promises made to Abraham and to the children of Promise – ultimately Israel; together with Another of Israel’s neighboring states. The previous section shows God blessing Ishmael and thus his descendants with many blessings including wealth – so that we can see the relationship between the Arabs and the Jews going back to that text, where this text will show to us the Edomites a people who were usually at odds with Israel; and here we learn a bit of the reason why – it has been this way from the beginning by God’s sovereignty but it was also needlessly exacerbated by the underhanded techniques of Jacob against his brother. Throughout history then both nations would continue to suffer injustice at each other’s hands at various times until roughly 1700 years after their inception they entirely disappeared in fulfillment of many prophecies.
(Easton, M.G. Easton’s Bible Dictionary. Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996, c1897.)
Theologically however we can begin to observe the mystery of prayer in God’s unfolding program. There are then five individual lessons that must not be taken apart but should rather be understood as a whole, and I think when taken together will help us to pray not only with greater faith but greater effectiveness, because we do actually serve a God who does more than merely answer prayer, He longs that we pray to Him so that His Purposes might be carried out. Read with me then if you will from Genesis 25:19-34.
As we enter this text there are a few main points that strike me as particularly important in regards to prayer.
1. God has Answered Prayer in the Past!
The marriage of Isaac, is a testimony to God answering prayer in the past (Gen 24, especially Gen 24:4,12-14,27,67).
The last time we were in this section, we saw the hope and trust and faith that can come to us as we recount how God has been faithful in the past. In like manner the second point is that...
2. God is Faithful to His Promises!
Again we covered this in our last look at Genesis, but nevertheless it is a continuing theme throughout the scriptures, and it is given to both instruct and encourage us. Here specifically we’re faced with the continuation of Abraham’s Family line through Isaac to the children and Jacob specifically (Gen. 17:19,21; 21:12; 25:5).
God has made multiple promises to continue the family line, and yet as this passage opens up we’re confronted immediately with a problem. We’re introduced in verse 20 to the fact that Gen 25:20 Isaac was forty when he married Rebekah, and for twenty years they waited for children. Gen. 25:21 There are many people struggling through the sorrow of not being able to have children. Sadly most of them suffer in silence. I know some and one close friend of mine has shared with me the difficulties they’ve faced as a couple but has also stated that through it all God’s grace has been sufficient. For twenty years Rebekah and Isaac struggled perhaps with fear and doubt. God had promised that the family line would be passed on, but they haven’t got a child, and it appears that just like his father, that there would never be a child.
The focus of the passage however is really the answered prayer of Isaac here - in such a way as to bring focus to the reality that God is the one who opened her womb. Which for Rebekah turned into both a blessing as well as a curse as the children literally fight within the womb, crushing one another. The answer to the prayer is a testimony again to God’s faithfulness but the most curious aspect is that Isaac even had to pray in the first place. After all, God had promised the child, Where was he? The almost too simple answer is that ...
3. God EXPECTS our Prayers. Even when he’s made a promise.
I’m fascinated by the role of prayer in the working out of God’s plan - It took at least 20 years! Isaac prayed that Rebekah became pregnant even though it was obviously God’s will that Isaac become a father as well (Genesis 17:19,21; 21:12; 25:5). Thus directing us to know that Our God is a prayer expecting God, (a prayer "respecting" God.)
Because God wants us to be in relationship with himself he waits for us to pray, even when the object of our prayers is something that we may have a promise for. In this way, we get to be active participants in our relationship with God.
And this is how we can pray with much faith, and this is much of what it means to pray in the name of Jesus; or to pray in the will of God. When we know what God’s will is – we are to pray as though it were a done deal, not merely a distant hope. As James said, we are to pray without doubting, because the doubting man will receive nothing for his prayers – he is an unstable man in all he does. But praying in faith – toward the will of God is praying with a guaranteed result because...
4. God is a prayer answering God Today.
Rebekah was troubled and went to inquire of the Lord that is to pray and God answered her. Of course the evidence that God answers prayer had already been given once because she was now pregnant (one prayer answered). But a second time in some unknown way either through an audible voice or through a prophet God spoke to her in response to her prayer. (Second prayer answered.)
Now I know that we have testimonies from time to time in this church about how God has answered prayers. But I’d bet that many times God answers prayers and we never hear about it. I’d like that to change. Specifically in the prayer and praise time Sunday Mornings I’d like to hear about answered prayers – this is how our own faith is strengthened as we hear about God’s work.
One of the most amazing things though that I see in this passage in regards to prayer and our relationship to God is that as God declares his will, he then will often wait until we pray to answer – and yet over all of the miracle of being able to speak to God and have the Almighty one actually answer us is the knowledge that God’s arm is not twisted by prayer, but he graciously involves us in his work even though he is Sovereign.
5. Our God is Sovereign.
God’s curious answer that the older will serve the younger is given to show us that our God is a sovereign God who’s choice takes precedence over works. He has elected certain individuals to his purpose of Salvation not by works that they have done but by his grace and good pleasure alone. He has elected them in eternity past - Ephesians 1:7-14; Not in accordance with works - 2 Timothy 1:9-10; Titus 3:5; Rom 9:13. Which means that election has NOTHING to do with foresight – as if God looked into the future to see who would choose Him and he then chose us – then it would be our choice and not God’s but Clearly God exercises his choice in eternity past in order that he might receive the Glory.
The Love / Hate Relationship depicted in Romans 9:13 (from Malachi 1:2-3), does not imply injustice but is given in typical rabbinic language to emphasize not the hatred Esau, but rather the excessive love of Jacob. The effect is saying that "I loved Jacob so much that by comparison it looks as though I hate Esau." I’ve discovered it’s actually a relatively common Rabbinic teaching technique. In the same way, in Luke 14:26 Jesus is not teaching people to have disgusting feelings of intense animosity towards their parents but to instead have so much love for Jesus that by comparison it appears that we hate our parents, our wife and children, and even our own life.
Some argue this isn’t fair. Yet neither deserved God’s gift: both Esau and Jacob made bad choices! Be glad God isn’t “fair” with us, but instead sovereignly showers us with His grace.4
It is true then as Walter Brueggemann writes of this passage, “Those who would enter this text ... discover that they are children of promise, wrought only by the will of God (James 1:18).” (Brueggemann, Walter. Genesis. Interpretation, a Bible commentary for teaching and preaching, Page 214. Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1982.)
God’s sovereignty shines out in this passage more clearly than in many others. But the miracle of grace is that, even though God could act and work completely apart from our involvement, he has actually chosen not to act – even on his revealed will until we ourselves step into the gap and begin praying.
The application then is that we must begin to incorporate in our prayers the promises of Scripture. Two thousand years ago Jesus promised to return soon. True a thousand years are no more than a day for God but did Jesus not also instruct us to pray “Thy kingdom come...”? I wonder if the lack of blessing in our lives, if the lack of fruit in our church, if the lack of new believers – or bigger still if the reason that Jesus Christ has not yet returned is because God is waiting for us to pray.
