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Title: Praying Like Jesus: The Lord's Prayer in a Culture of Prosperity by Jim Mulholland, James Mulholland ISBN: 0-06-001156-4 Publisher: Harper SanFrancisco Pub. Date: 18 September, 2001 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.2 (10 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Word of God never returns void
Comment: In the middle of this book, I was ready to throw it in the trash - BUT I am glad I didn't. You may well be frustrated by some of the liberal theology in this book. Hang in there, the book isn't about the author or theology, it is about Jesus and the Word of God. The author feels there is a resurge in health and wealth Gospel thinking due to the popular "Prayer of Jabez" book. The point of this book is to encourage the social Gospel aspect of Christianity. All in all, the book has a very Godly and timely point, and is presented in an inspiring way, through the Lords prayer. A chapter named "Deliver Us" uses the AA 12 step plan as a way to think about recovering from our "addiction" to prosperity / greed / money, and is a very powerful chapter indeed.
The book is flawed (all books but one are), but it is in the end a fresh and inspiring commentary on a familiar portion of the Word of God. God tells us that when His Word goes out "It shall not return to Me void" (Isaiah 55:11). True always and true again. In the time I spent with the book I was puzzled, irritated, disgusted, convicted, inspired, and challenged (roughly in that order).
Rating: 5
Summary: Prayer in perfect form
Comment: Recently I wrote a review on the book 'The Prayer of Jabez.' I outlined in that review some of the things I appreciated about that book, but also recounted the many things that made me uneasy with both the development and the intention most seem to pick up from the practice of the prayer.
There are few things in our lives that are as personal and touch us as deeply as prayer, particularly our own prayer life. We each feel we are an expert at praying in our own ways, and to a large extent, each of us is. For this deep part of our lives to be co-opted by a feeling of selfish intention for personal gain is tragic. This is why I considered 'The Prayer of Jabez' problematic - the author's intent might not be selfishness, but the message being heard is precisely that.
In searching for an alternative to hold up as a model more in keeping with my own prayer temperament, Charles Allen, a theology professor at my seminary, directed me to James Mulholland's 'Praying Like Jesus: The Lord's Prayer in a Culture of Prosperity.'
The book begins where the disciples of Jesus began -- Thomas asks Jesus to teach them how to pray. In an interesting, fictional conversation, the disciples recount their experience of praying another prayer that seems to work better for them (of course, this is the prayer of Jabez). Many followers of Jesus seem to slink away after hearing Jesus tell people that they should stop asking for an increase in territory, but rather ask God to provide for their needs; that they should stop asking for a blessing in earthly terms, but rather be willing to follow the will of God even to death, to 'take up their crosses and follow'. This teaching is too hard to follow!
'This is not what happened two thousand years ago. Unfortunately, it is happening today in thousands of churches and with millions of Christians. ... Thousands of Christians are repeating an obscure prayer first uttered by a man named Jabez over three thousand years ago. Many have become convinced his words are the formula for prosperity.'
As Mulholland points out correctly, Wilkinson did not intend his prayer to become a manifesto for righteous greed. He also points out that neither Jabez nor the Bible hold up the prayer of Jabez as a model for anyone but Jabez to follow.
'This honour is reserved for another short prayer located in the gospels of Matthew and Luke. It is the prayer Jesus taught his disciples to pray. We call this prayer The Lord's Prayer, though I prefer to call it the Prayer of Jesus.'
Mulholland does not promise riches or special healing or power; he does not give the magic formula for getting what you want. What he does is reiterate the intentions of Jesus with the Prayer of Jesus -- an opportunity to reconnect with God and with each other through the words that, as the disciple Peter said, 'contain eternal life'.
The first chapter is entitled When You Pray. This, of course, assumes that you pray. Not if, but when. Mulholland talks about the prayer of self-righteousness and the prayer of self-interest. These prayers are one-communication, but even worse than that, they are directive or instructive, as if God needs to be told what to do or informed of something God did not yet know (such as, how good we've been lately). God is put in the mode of Santa Claus. Jesus gives a corrective to this.
'Praying like Jesus offers far more than prosperity. When prayed with sincerity, it cleanses our hearts of self-righteousness and strips our motives of self-interest. It challenges the false and inappropriate ways we approach God and each other. It reminds us of what we so easily forget -- our proper relationship to God and the world.'
Praying like Jesus reminds us of God more than it invokes ourselves. Praying like Jesus also reminds us of our needs as a community. This prayer is a prayer for the world, a world in which the will of God is primary.
The other chapters give insights into the particular parts of the Lord's Prayer: chapter titles include Our Father, Thy Kingdom Come, Give Us, Forgive Us, and Deliver Us. Each of these chapters stress the love of God for us, the importance of community, the importance of relationship, and the need to see who and where we are in right respect of God. This is not a prayer for become rich and famous, which is the trap of much of current culture, including the prayer of Jabez and many other 'Christian' things.
'This obsession with material blessing, at the expense of the spiritual, is a congenital disease. Being born an American is to be so afflicted. Jim Bakker was merely the most blatant prophet of a philosophy to which most of us pledge allegiance. His lifestyle was an exaggeration of a nearly universal merger of religious life and the predominant values of our culture. He sprinkled holy water on the American way.'
Of course, one of the problems with the Lord's Prayer is that it has become, for most Christians, an almost genetically-encoded prayer routine that it is done without thinking. Unfortunately, this means it is almost always done with comprehension on any level; it is just one more part of the liturgy that we say in our drive to get on and get through on our way to the next thing. Praying like Jesus requires us to pay attention, and pay attention deeply. Mulholland's final word in the conclusion is a charge for us to regain this attention and incorporate the prayer anew into our lives deeply and with meaning that it has in abundance, but which we've missed for so long.
Rating: 4
Summary: Mulholland Has It Right
Comment: An explosive and at times infuriorating look into the Lord's Prayer. It was a defining moment for me to step back from prayer as I know it and to make absolute sense as to what it meant to me, personally. The outcome was absolutely personal, and something that I needed. be GOD's!
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Title: If Grace Is True : Why God Will Save Every Person by Philip Gulley, James Mulholland ISBN: 006251704X Publisher: HarperSanFrancisco Pub. Date: 08 July, 2003 List Price(USD): $22.95 |
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Title: Lord and His Prayer by N. T. Wright ISBN: 0802843204 Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company Pub. Date: 01 April, 1997 List Price(USD): $10.00 |
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Title: Lord Teach Us: The Lord's Prayer & the Christian Life by William H. Willimon, Stanley Hauerwas, Scott C. Saye ISBN: 0687006147 Publisher: Abingdon Press Pub. Date: 01 January, 1996 List Price(USD): $10.00 |
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Title: The Prayer Of Jesus by Hank Hanegraaff ISBN: 0849917301 Publisher: W Publishing Group Pub. Date: 04 September, 2001 List Price(USD): $9.99 |
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Title: Dakota: A Spiritual Geography by Kathleen Norris ISBN: 0618127240 Publisher: Mariner Books Pub. Date: 06 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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