Be Careful What You Pray For

I think this is a harmful admonishment that needs to go the way of the dinosaur:

“Be careful what you pray for – God just might give it to you!”

I think it paints a different picture of God than that revealed in the Bible. Although I’ve often heard it as a half-joke, it’s wormed its way into my view of God and left me scared to pray, and scared of how God will treat me.

It’s a religious twist of the warning: “Be careful what you wish for – it just might come true.” There are many fables that communicate this. In his avarice, King Midas wished that everything he touched would turn to gold. But when his daughter ran and embraced him, she turned to gold, and Midas found that the cost was greater than the benefit.

I think this warning has value. It reminds us that we often don’t know what’s best for ourselves. We are limited in our understanding and foresight, and that which we pine for might prove to be destructive. Let us take care.

But in real life there are no magic wishes: No genies or fairies, or power in shooting stars and blowing out candles. It’s only superstition or, ironically, wishful thinking.

Ah, but God! We can pray to him, and he has the power to answer every request. It’s not a wish that we bring before him, but a petition. He is not a cosmic genie that grants our every whim. He’s not a divine vending machine that dispenses goodies if we but put in the right payment. No, he is God of the universe, King of kings, far above all created being, and he decides how he will answer us.

How does he decide? We cannot comprehend the ways of God, but he has partially revealed himself to us in the Bible, and that revelation we can count on utterly. To those who have come to God in repentance and faith, he has made his spiritual children:

“[Jesus] came into the world—the world he had created—and the world failed to recognize him. He came into his own creation, and his own people would not accept him. Yet wherever men did accept him he gave them the power to become sons of God. These were the men who truly believed in him, and their birth depended not on the course of nature nor on any impulse or plan of man, but on God.”    — John 1:10-13

And to his children, he is “Father.” A good and perfect father. Jesus, in telling his disciples how to pray, said this:

“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”    –Matthew 7:9-11

Human parents who love their children do what is best for them. Despite being imperfect and tainted by sin and selfishness, they care for their children and delight to give them good gifts. They don’t serve up rocks for dinner or toss them a venomous snake. So God, the perfect, loving Father, won’t do this either!

I think we can logically go a step further and say that if a child should ask for rocks for dinner or a venomous snake to play with, his parents won’t oblige. Should we expect anything less of our heavenly father?

Let’s return to the phrase: “Be careful what you pray for – God just might give it to you.” If I foolishly pray for something that will prove harmful to me, will God grant my request? I don’t think so.

This saying makes me think of a god who is ready to catch me in the act of wrongdoing. One who, when I pray foolishly, says, “Aha! You think that’s a good idea? I’ll show you just how wrong you are! Here, catch this snake! *cackle* That’ll teach her.”

I find that idea terrifying. It leaves me afraid to pray. Afraid to ask God for anything, because if it’s a terrible idea he’ll drop it on my head anyway. But this is not how God’s child is meant to live.

When Jesus instructed his disciples in prayer, through his model prayer and subsequent illustrations (including the snake example cited above), his entire point was that Father God gives what is best to his children. That we may seek him in confidence, asking for our needs, and trusting that he will answer in perfect love.

The apostle John wrote:

“This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins… If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us… There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”    — 1  John 4:9-10, 15-16, 19

Because Jesus paid for all of our sins, we who are God’s children are no longer under God’s righteous wrath and condemnation. To fear God’s response to my prayers, motivations, and desires is to fear punishment for my wrongs. But by his love and sacrifice, there is no longer any cause to fear. His love is unconditional. There’s nothing I can do today to make him love me less, and nothing I can do to make him love me more.

The apostle Paul, in writing to the believers in ancient Rome, encouraged them by these words:

“He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.”    — Romans 8:32-24

What greater gift and expression of love could God give? He gave up what was most precious to Him, his one and only Son. He gave his very life to reconcile me to himself and make me his child. And if he gave me the most extravagant gift in the universe, will he withhold anything else from me? Surely not!

The risen Jesus is now with God the Father. His death and life forever atone for my sin and make me righteous before God. The writer to the Hebrews, just after the time of Christ, called Jesus our High Priest, the one who intercedes for humanity to God.

“Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”    — Hebrews 4:16

I think I need a new phrase, to help me come to God in Biblical prayer and to remember the secure, loving relationship I have with him. Perhaps this will do:

“Be confident when you pray – God is your loving Father!”