A warning for prayer weasels

Did you know that there are times when Satan would love for you to pray?




How many times have you been talking to someone who's obviously doing something they shouldn't and, when confronted with this fact, he responds, "Well, I guess I need to pray about that"?

How many times have you known someone who sees the commands of Scripture and is in a position to fulfill them, but begs off his duty by claiming that he needs to pray about the situation before he can act?

All niceness aside now ... how many times have you used prayer as an excuse for disobedience?

Because that's what it is:  disobedience.  Another word for "disobedience" is "sin".  Another word for "sin" is "rebellion".  And that's what we're doing when we refuse to do God's will, either by the things we do or the things we don't do.  We're rebelling against God.

Satan rebelled against God, didn't he?  He convinced our earliest parents to rebel against God.  The Bible is full of people who rebelled against God; so is the rest of history.  The entire story of the human race is a litany of rebellions against God.

But even worse than that is trying to justify rebellion with pious nonsense like, "I just need to pray about it."  Far be it from me to run down prayer; like the man said, we got 99 problems, but too much prayin' ain't one.  There are times, though, when we don't need to "seek God in prayer" over whether or not to do something.

If, for example, the Bible clearly says to do something, then it's not necessary to ask if you should do it.  Ask for courage, yes; for strength, for wisdom, for compassion, of course.  But only so you can do what you're told to do.

If the Bible says, "Thou shalt not", then that doesn't require clarification.  Don't do it, and don't say you're going to pray about it when you're really just trying to find a loophole that will allow you to do the very thing you "shalt not".

God speaks to people in different ways, but he never contradicts himself.  The Holy Spirit you ask for guidance in prayer is the same Holy Spirit who inspired the inerrant Bible.  This isn't like when we were kids and we asked the same question to both parents, trying to play them against each other.  It's the same God, and since he's all-knowing, all-wise, and all-everything, it's not like you're going to slip anything by him.

Just man up and stop being a prayer weasel!