{"id":8694,"date":"2014-11-13T21:49:19","date_gmt":"2014-11-14T02:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/?p=8694"},"modified":"2014-11-13T21:51:25","modified_gmt":"2014-11-14T02:51:25","slug":"book-review-prayer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/?p=8694","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: Prayer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"prayer\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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“To be a child of God means access. \u00a0We know God is attentively listening to us and watching us<\/em>.” Tim Keller, Prayer<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

I am a huge fan of Tim Keller<\/a>. \u00a0I’m not really a huge fan of Keller because of anything he has done…but rather because of what Christ has done through him…through a life yielded and open to the movement of the Holy Spirit that has been poured out in his teaching and his writing. \u00a0His newest book, Prayer<\/em>, is a powerful reminder of the biggest blessing of being a Christian…access to our Heavenly Father. \u00a0I am sad to say that this is an area of my life that I haven’t been focused on and I have missed out on some of God’s most amazing blessings as a result of that. \u00a0Keller’s book is not condemning…it’s encouraging. \u00a0As always I have a great appreciation for the amount of Scripture he uses in his writing and his teaching in an obvious effort to point the learner to Jesus rather than to himself. \u00a0This book follows the normal Keller pattern of using tons of Scripture while teaching sound theology leading the reader towards the ultimate practical application. \u00a0I can honestly say that I have a renewed passion for prayer and revived spirit for how God wants to use prayer to speak truth into my life.<\/p>\n

Here are several things that I highlighted while reading…<\/p>\n

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    \n
  • Besides looking at the actual prayers of the Bible, we should consider also the Scripture\u2019s theology of prayer\u2014the reasons in God and in our created nature that human beings are able to pray.<\/li>\n
  • We are not called to choose between a Christian life based on truth and doctrine or a life filled with spiritual power and experience. \u00a0They go together.<\/li>\n
  • If we give priority to the outer life, our inner life will be dark and scary.<\/li>\n
  • You can\u2019t manufacture the unmistakable note of reality that only comes from speaking not toward God but with him. \u00a0The depths of private prayer and public prayer grow together.<\/li>\n
  • Prayer tunes your heart to God.<\/li>\n
  • Through Christ, prayer becomes what Scottish Reformer John Knox called \u201can earnest and familiar talking with God,\u201d and John Calvin called an \u201cintimate conversation\u201d of believers with God, or elsewhere,\u201da communion of men with God\u201d\u2014a two-way communicative interaction. \u00a0\u201cFor through Christ we have access to the Father by the Spirit.\u201d \u00a0Ephesians 2:18<\/li>\n
  • We would never produce the full range of biblical prayer if we were initiating prayer according to our own inner needs and psychology. \u00a0It can only be produced if we are responding in prayer according to who God is as revealed in the Scripture.<\/li>\n
  • To be a child of God means access. \u00a0We know God is attentively listening to us and watching us.<\/li>\n
  • Prayer is the way to experience a powerful confidence that God is handling our lives well, that our bad things will turn out for good, our good things cannot be taken from us, and the best things are yet to come.<\/li>\n
  • We have the ultimate mediator and priest to end all priests (Hebrews 4:14-15). \u00a0He eliminates the gap so that we can know God as friend (Exodus 33:11).<\/li>\n
  • Because in Jesus God became human, he is not only the God on the other side of the chasm, he is the bridge over the gap. \u00a0Thus he is the mediator of a new relationship with God that cannot fail because it is based on is faithfulness, not ours (Hebrews 9:14-16).<\/li>\n
  • “To see the law by Christ fulfilled and hear his pardoning voice transforms a slave into a child and duty into choice.\u201d William Cowper, Olney Hymns<\/i><\/li>\n
  • The God to whom Christians pray is a triune God. \u00a0We can pray because God is our loving Father, because Christ is our mediator giving us access to the throne of the universe, and because the Spirit himself indwells us.<\/li>\n
  • \u201cOne thing have I desired of the Lord, one thing I will seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord to behold the beauty of the Lord.\u201d \u00a0Psalm 27:4<\/li>\n
  • Prayer must be persevering. \u00a0\u201cI urge you\u201d wrote Paul tot he Christians at Rome, \u201cto join me in my struggle by praying to God for me\u201d Romans 15:30. \u00a0Prayer is striving.<\/li>\n
  • These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. \u00a0Matthew 15:8<\/li>\n
  • And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. \u00a0With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all of the Lord\u2019s people. \u00a0Ephesians 6:18<\/li>\n
  • We must avoid extremes\u2014of either not asking God for things or of thinking we can bend God\u2019s will to ours. \u00a0We must combine tenacious importunity, a \u201cstriving with God\u201d, with deep acceptance of God\u2019s wise will, whatever it is.<\/li>\n
  • If we want freedom from being driven by fear, ambition, greed, lust, addictions, and inner emptiness, we must learn how to meditate on Christ until his glory breaks in upon our souls.<\/li>\n
  • In the Garden of Eden, we sinned and lost the face of God. \u00a0This was the greatest disaster possible, because we were designed to live in the unique, perfect, marvelous light of his countenance. \u00a0We have wandered empty and destitute. \u00a0Moses realized that, in the beatific vision of the face of God, all his longings would be fulfilled. \u00a0He asked to see it\u2014but his sin was a barrier. \u00a0In Jesus that barrier is taken away and we can being to see, though only partially and by faith, the light of the glory of God in the face of Christ. \u00a0When we meditate and pray the gospel and its attendant truths into our hearts with the power of the Spirit, those longings are slowly satisfied, and other things in life become gifts rather than gods, and we slowly but surely and radically change in our character and in all our relationships.<\/li>\n
  • Prayer encounter with God takes the love of God, the greatness of God, the power of God, the wisdom of God\u2014which most of us experience only on audio\u2014and puts it on video. \u00a0Prayer plunges us into the fullness of who he is, and his love becomes more real than the rejection or disappointment we are experiencing. \u00a0Then we can handle our problems, and we can hold our heads up again.<\/li>\n
  • The more we know we are forgiven, the more we repent; the faster we grow and change, the deeper our humility and our joy.<\/li>\n
  • Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable to his will, in the name of Christ, with confession of our sins, and thankful acknowledgement of his mercies. \u00a0(from the Westminster Shorter Catechism)<\/li>\n
  • We should ask God for things with boldness and specificity, with ardor, honesty, and diligence, yet with patient submission to God\u2019s will and wise love. \u00a0All because of Jesus, and all in his name.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n
    <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      “To be a child of God means access. \u00a0We know God is attentively listening to us and watching us.” Tim Keller, Prayer I am a huge fan of Tim Keller. \u00a0I’m not really a huge fan of Keller because of anything he has done…but rather because of what Christ has done through him…through a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,14,28,17,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bible-study","category-book-review","category-integrity","category-leadership","category-truth"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8694"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8694\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}