Praying Like a Spice Girl

A lot of hefty biblical precepts have been bumper-stickerized. What this does is trivialize the message behind the sticker. “In God we trust,” sponsored by the state of Georgia and flaunted by most of the state’s discourteous drivers. “Jesus is coming soon…and boy is he pissed.” (While I kind of like that one, it makes us laugh at something that should cause us to do a healthy self-evaluation.)

Today we talk about one that has been trivialized within the church by the church, not by those outside. I refer, of course, to, “In Jesus’ name,” the magic words uttered at the end of even the most outrageous prayers to guarantee God’s compliance.

James seemed (seems) to have different ideas. Barclay says, “James is setting before his people a basic question—whether their aim in life is to submit to the will of God or to gratify their own desires for the pleasures of this world.”

James uses some pretty explicit words.

The word translated fight twice in the NIV.

Some translations water down the word.

The word is used of warfare and means violent conflict.

The word NIV translates quarrels means long-term, deep resentment, the kind that leads to violence.

He used the word murder, not necessarily a metaphor as we shall see.

The words envy, covet, desire mean to lust for something that rightly belongs to another and plot how to get it.

And then, he called some folk’s prayers not wrong or bad but wicked.

Now lets follow James’ progression.

There were obviously fights and quarrels within James’ congregation.

These could have been within a member’s own heart and mind, but the language tends to lend itself to other interpretations.

There seems to have been at least some physical violence within the membership.

And considering some of James’ new believers would have been Zealots, the violence could have been directed to those outside.

Regardless of the subject of the violence, the cause was the same.

The cause was the desire for physical pleasure, especially forbidden sexual pleasure.

Here James used another word for battle that means act like a soldier.

It’s made worse because they’re not getting what they want.

Now we get into the “Not In Jesus’ Name” part.

He started off innocently enough “You don’t have because you don’t ask.”

But then he shifts gears.

“Okay, okay, you do ask.”

But you don’t get what you ask for because you pray wicked prayers.

Your prayers are wicked because the things you ask for are wicked.

Be careful here; notice why the prayers are wicked.

The things are not wicked because the things are necessarily wicked in and of themselves, but because of why the pray-er wants them.

Now we come to what, “In Jesus’ name,” really means.

I’m gonna pray like a Spice Girl, “I’ll tell you what I want what I really, really want.”

But I’ll hear like Jesus in Gethsemane.

How much wickedness has been unleashed on the world because of Christians trying to answer their own prayers…in Jesus’ name?