What We Love Watching
Most of us love watching television. The average American watches between four and five hours of television a day. Two thirds of us watch television while we eat dinner. Over half of us pay for cable TV. We love television. We love it so much that we usually make the TV the centerpiece of our living rooms. So much that we’ll spend money we don’t have on getting bigger and better and more TV’s. So much that, at the end of a long day, we’d rather hear what it has to say rather than our spouse or children or friends.
Many of us also love watching social media. The average daily usage of social media worldwide in 2017 was 135 minutes per day, up from 126 in 2016. Sixty-five percent of adults use social networking sites. Ninety percent of adults 18-29 use social media. Facebook continues to be the most popular social networking site, with nearly two billion users worldwide. Many of us love watching what goes on in the world of social media.
These statistics don’t apply to everyone. But they do paint a picture of our cultural moment, of where we are at this time in history. We’re a people who seem to gravitate toward screens rather than people, to images rather than words, to distraction rather than productivity, to commentary rather than conversation, to temporal things rather than eternal things.
Nothing New
This, by the way, is nothing new. We’ve always been prone to look down instead of up. This is why Paul commands the church at Colossae to “Set your minds on things above, not on things that are on earth” (3:2). Part of Satan’s scheme in the Garden of Eden was to convince us that created things are more fulfilling and sweet and worthy of our attention than the Creator God who made those things. Televisions and smart phones and tablets and video games and movies and Netflix and social media and the worldwide web are just the most recent and most current temptations to look down instead of up.
Technology Is Not Inherently Evil
I use the word “temptation” here on purpose. None of these things are evil in themselves. Technology isn’t inherently evil. If it is, then we should get rid of all technological advancements. This would mean that our cars need to go because the innovative technology of the wheel or the internal combustion engine are evil and need to be discarded. In his great book 12 Ways Your Phone is Changing You, Tony Reinke provides us with a “theology of technology.” He says that “Technology is the reordering of raw materials for human purposes.” This is what chefs and chemists and engineers and musicians and writers and builders and designers do. They reorder raw materials in order to help others.
This is good and right. But technology, like everything else, can become the focus and center of our lives, rather than the One who gave us life. We can make anything an idol. We can give anything ultimate importance. We can find our hope and joy and purpose in anything. We can look to Facebook or family, computers or cars, widgets or work to shape our identity.
The key isn’t to throw out the baby with the bathwater. The key is to maintain a proper focus and perspective concerning created things. To see things for what they are. To guard against making them ultimate. And to train ourselves to live in ways that reveal that Jesus is the most precious and valuable and central thing in our lives.
Prayer is a Means of Grace
God, in his grace, has given us several things to help us do this. Two of the most obvious, most important, and most neglected are prayer and Scripture. We’re focusing on prayer and Scripture reading in our Sunday School hour during the month of January and during our corporate worship time this week and next week.
Theologians have called prayer and Scripture reading “means of grace.” They are things that God has given us that serve as channels of his grace to us. Not saving grace. The only channel that saving grace comes through is faith in Christ. But the grace that we need to keep going, to keep trusting, to keep loving and following Jesus comes to us through specific means, or avenues. It doesn’t just magically appear. It comes through specific God-intended channels.
“Continue Steadfastly”
Prayer is one of these channels. And because it’s so important and necessary for the Christian life, it’s commanded in the New Testament. One place in particular is Colossians 4:2. The word here for “continue steadfastly,” or “devote yourselves to,” or “persevere in,” can also mean “to keep close company with” or, “to be in attendance with.” Paul commands us to live with prayer, to hang out with prayer, to attend things with prayer, to be a friend of prayer.
Paul’s choice of language here also makes it clear that prayer isn’t for a select few super-spiritual Christians, but is rather for all who profess Christ. The word for “continue steadfastly” is in the imperative tense in the original language. This means that it’s a command, not a suggestion. Prayer in Paul’s mind isn’t optional for the church or the Christian. It’s mandatory. It’s required. It’s obligatory. It’s not something we do if and when we feel like it or if and when we have time. It’s something we’re supposed to do. Period. Not praying is therefore disobedience.
Pray Like the Persistent Widow
Why does Paul command us to pray? Because he knows that we’re prone to laziness and complacency in our spiritual lives. He knows that we’re prone to be more like Martha than Mary, more prone to busy ourselves in the kitchen than to sit down and talk to God.
He also knows that we’re prone to lose heart when our requests aren’t immediately answered. So he tells us to “persevere,” to keep going in prayer. We should be like the persistent widow that Jesus talks about in Luke 18:1-8.
The point of the parable is that if a dishonest judge responds to a persistent widow like this, how much more will God respond to his children! This widow was getting on the judge’s nerves, he was literally “beat down by her continual coming” (v. 5). This woman is wearing out this judge emotionally. She’s a nuisance to him, and so the judge finally relents and grants her justice.
If this insensitive, selfish, unjust judge responds to repeated pleas from someone he doesn’t know or care about, how much more will a righteous God respond to his children? The argument of the parable is not that if you can wear out an unjust human judge, then you may be able to wear out God so that he helps you just to get you off his back.
This parable is intended to be an encouragement for us to pray continually until Jesus comes back. Notice verse 8, “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” Jesus is saying, “When I come back, will I find that my disciples have kept praying, or that they’ve lost heart and given up, or that they’re consumed with worldly distractions?” The implication here is that prayer and faith stand and fall together. If we lose heart and drift away from prayer, then the Son of Man will not find faith in us when he comes.
Persevering prayer becomes a primary piece of evidence of whether or not we belong to Jesus when he returns. Prayer is a means of grace, helping us to keep going in faith. But it’s also an evidence of grace. In other words, if you’ve experienced the grace of God in Christ, then prayer will be a part of your life. Maybe not for an hour or two each morning, but those who know Christ will talk to Christ. Those who have no desire to talk to him need to consider whether they actually know him. J. I. Packer, in his book Knowing God – perhaps one of the best Christian books written in the last century, says, “Men who know their God are before anything else men who pray.” Communication with God is a natural outflow of knowing God.
“Being Watchful In It”
The next thing Paul says in Colossians 4:2 is that we should “be watchful” in prayer. What does that mean? It means that we should stay awake in our prayers. The word literally means “to keep awake” or “to keep alert.” The New Jerusalem Bible translates it, “stay awake to pray.” And the New Living Bible says to pray with “an alert mind.” Paul is insisting that we pray with focus. That we pay attention to what we’re doing. That we not simply repeat meaningless phrases. This is probably what Jesus meant when he said, “And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words” (Matt. 6:7).
As I said in Sunday School, we should seek to pray specific, rather than general prayers. And this takes focus and work. For example, when our brother Austin was in East Asia, I hope we prayed prayers like, “Lord, protect our brother from the lies and distractions and temptations of the Evil One.” Instead of the more generic, “Lord, please keep our brother safe.” Or when we pray for our church, we should pray specific things like, “Lord, please bless our church with unity and holiness and passion for the glory of God and the spread of the gospel.” Rather than generic things like, “Lord, please bless our church.” This kind of praying takes focus.
“Watchfulness” also implies urgency. Jesus says in Matthew 24:42, “Therefore, stay awake, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.” Prayer is one of the ways that we make ourselves ready for the Lord’s return. We “watch” for him in prayer. We wait for him. We long for him to come. We ask for him to come quickly.
One of the things that happens when we pray is that we reorient ourselves to ultimate reality. To the reality that there is a God who is holy and mighty. A Christ who died to save us from eternal death. A resurrection that will happen when he returns. And an eternal future for every person in heaven or hell. We need the reorienting effects of prayer because we’re so easily distracted, especially in this age of the smart-phone. Tony Reinke says, “Our battle against the encumbering distractions of this world – especially the unnecessary distractions of our phones – is a heart war we can wage only if our affections are locked firmly on the glory of Christ…The beauty of Christ calms us and roots our deepest longings in eternal hopes that are far beyond what our smartphones can ever hope to deliver.”
Prayer, and Scripture reading, is the practical way that this happens. Prayer releases us from bondage to the endless distraction of media. It does this by turning our gaze upwards and outwards. When we start looking to, listening to, and talking to Jesus, the things of this earth will begin to look strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace.
Practical Suggestions
Many of you may be waiting for me to give you some real practical help on how you can improve your prayer life in 2018. So here it is. There’s no one way to obey this command to pray with watchfulness and steadfastness. It’ll look different for all of us. But some general principles can help all of us. Let me offer three suggestions:
First, make private prayer a priority. Many of us just “pray as we go.” These kinds of prayers are good and biblical. Paul says to “pray continually” (1 Thess. 5:17). Prayer should be scattered throughout our day as we’re in the car, at the office, checking email, in the shower.
But this cannot be the only way we pray. If it is, we’re not doing what Jesus told us to do in Matthew 6:6, “When you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret.” To do this we must find a quiet place with no distractions. We’ll need to turn TV’s off, silence our phones, and shut our computers.
This might mean waking up earlier or staying up later. It might be five minutes at first. The quality is much more important than the quantity. The Lord isn’t holding a stop-watch to see how long we can pray. But if we want intimacy with him, we must get alone with him. We must seek him in the secret place, a place where we aren’t rushed or distracted.
Second, we need to avoid prayerless praying. What is prayerless praying? It’s praying with our minds and not our hearts. Back to Jesus’ words in Matthew 6: “And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words” (v. 7). When we “heap up”, or pile up, lots of words but aren’t truly engaged in what we’re saying, we’re doing prayerless praying.
This is always a struggle for me. I find myself praying the same exact things over and over and over at night when I’m praying with Suzy and our boys. They aren’t bad things to pray for, but my heart isn’t engaged. I’m repeating and reciting the right phrases and words but I’m not actually talking to God. I’m saying what I should say, but God isn’t interested in my “empty phrases.” He wants me to come before him with a genuine heart.
One of the best ways to avoid this is to pause before you pray in order to set your mind and heart on God. There’s no need to rush into praying. God isn’t in a hurry to hear from you. But he does want to actually hear from you, not just hear you repeat all the phrases you hear at church. Another way to avoid this is to write down your prayers. Consider keeping a prayer journal.
Another way we can avoid prayerless praying is the third suggestion I want to give you. Fill your prayers with the Bible, with statements about who God is, what he’s done, his promises, his attributes. In order to do this, of course, you’ll need to actually be reading the Bible. Praying and Scripture go together. God talks to us in Scripture, we talk to God in prayer.
Pray your way through the passage you’re reading. God loves his own handwriting, especially his promises. So turn his promises back around to him in prayer (use Phil. 4:4-7 as an example).
Watch for God in 2018
May you make 2018 a year in which you watch for God through prayer more than you watch television or your phone. May we talk to God through prayer before we read the social media feeds. May we obey Scripture and keep going in prayer until Jesus returns. May we grow in alertness and awakeness as we seek the One who never gets tired.
As we watch for God in our prayers, let’s also get ready to watch God answer our prayers. And as we watch for God, may we remember that he first watched for us. He saw us in our plight, unable to save ourselves, and turned his full attention and used all the resources of his power to intervene for us, sending Jesus to die on the cross for our sins and rise from the dead in order to save everyone who trusts in him and turns from themselves and their sin. May God’s turning to us in Christ compel us to turn to him in prayer.