![]() Perhaps in one of the best books on prayer that I have read “A Praying Life” Paul E. Miller argues for embracing the explainable mystery that exists in following Christ. I have included text from this book on pages 110 through 112. I recommend reading this book, it is a good read. Something mysterious happens in the hidden contours of life when we pray. If we try to figure out the mystery, it will elude us. The mystery is real. Many things in life cannot be observed directly. In quantum physics, you can’t observe a particle’s speed and mass at the same time. Sexual love in marriage is beautiful; sexual love observed is pornography. The act of observing changes sexual intimacy. So things just disappear when you try to capture or observe them. Prayer is strikingly intimate. As soon as you take a specific answer to prayer and try to figure out what caused it, you lose God. Trying to dissect how prayer works is like using a magnifying glass to try to figure out why a woman is beautiful. If you turn God into an object, He has a way of disappearing. If you are going to enter this divine dance we call prayer, you have to surrender your desire to be in control, to figure out how prayer works. You’ve got to let God take the lead. (p. 110-112) C.S. Lewis pointed out that if you could see through everything eventually you see nothing. “you cannot go on ‘explaining away’ forever you will find you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ forever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it…if you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To ‘see though all things’ is the same as not to see.” (p. 77) There are three Bible texts that I have found that support this. 2 Timothy 3:7 Always learning and never able to come to a knowledge of the truth. There are those who are always looking for an explanation but are not able to draw any kind of conclusion so that are in a state of constant searching. The only thing that they are certain of is that a person cannot be certain. They are certainly uncertain. I Corinthians 2:14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. These truths can only be “discerned” with a spiritual mind. Spiritual truth cannot be derived by the natural mind. It is the same as person trying to drive to Hawaii from California in a car. I Corinthians 3:18 Let no one deceive himself. If anyone among you thinks that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool that he may become wise. For the wisdom of the world is folly with God. For it is written “He catches the wise in their craftiness,” and again, “the Lord knows the thoughts of the wise that they are futile.” One cannot appreciate the mystery of Godliness if they are worried about appearing foolish to unbelievers. The topic of Godliness is simply way too complex for the human mind. That is why we must embrace its mystery. If you need things to make sense before you place your faith in them you will never see answered prayer.
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Bro. WillI am a 52-year-old Southern Baptist Pastor with my wife Jennifer and two daughters Katie and Bridget. Archives
March 2022
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