Prayer

When we pray, we acknowledge three things:

· Our responsibility

· Our dependency

· God's sufficiency

Firstly, our responsibility: When we pray we are acknowledging that we must pray. God is gracious to us. He loves us and wants to bless us, but we need to ask for His blessings and guidance on ourselves and for others. God could bless us without our involvement, but He has ordained things so that He expects us to pray for His blessings. God can be relied upon to play His part. We must also accept our part too, which is to pray regularly, specifically, earnestly. When Jesus taught His disciples to pray He said "When you pray" not `If you pray'. Jesus expects us to pray. That is our responsibility. Samuel the prophet says: "As for me, far be it for me that I should sin against the Lord by failing to pray for you" (Samuel 12:23). When we pray, acknowledge our responsibility.

Secondly, our dependency:

Our responsibility and our dependency are closely related. Perhaps an illustration can help us to understand this. A farmer ploughs his fields, sows the seeds and cultivates the soil. But all the time he realizes that the hoped-for harvest is outside his control. He knows that he cannot make the seed grow, or make the sun to shine. Yet the farmer also knows that unless he diligently ploughs the field, sows the seed and cultivates the soil he cannot expect a good harvest. It is only when he fulfils his responsibilities can he reap the rewards. The farmer cannot do what God must do and God will not do what the farmer should do. And it is the same principle in our spiritual lives. We have the responsibility and also the privilege of being co-workers with God. He is gracious enough to want us to be involved in His eternal work. We must pray, but when we pray we are dependent on God to answer our prayers and fulfil His will.

Finally, when we pray we acknowledge God's sufficiency: We need to be reminded that there is nothing, ultimately, that can frustrate God's plan and purpose. For the non-Christian, they cannot fight God and win, and for us as Christians, it is our privilege to cooperate with God's purposes or He simply gets someone else who will, and we lose out on the blessings which could have been ours. God is infinite in His wisdom, perfect in His love, and Almighty Sovereign in His power. There is nothing which is greater than God. Not evil, not wickedness, not anything at all. And God is working out His sovereign will through the means of our prayers. Our prayers, when they are in accord with God's will, can change things. Our prayers make a difference, our prayers can and do count. That is why we pray.

David Yelulani (Banket, Zimbabwe)