Wednesday Night Service or Gossip Hour?

[exIFB]

But that's adorable.

[LutheranEmily]

that is pretty adorable.

[Historian]

Yes, TMI!!! (Not the fish...the original post)

For one thing, as you said, it's not like God doesn't know about this. But for another I think there's also an element of misunderstanding about what's really important. My friend has cancer. Well sure we'd like her to be healed. But the Lord sent this trial, and He has a heavenly perspective. Obviously, Christians die and always have. We say we believe in heaven: so how do we know this isn't God's time for her to join Him? So I think some of the TMI stuff is that we think the really "important" request is that she not have any pain, and get better really quickly, and it not cost any money and all the nurses get saved. I mean, if none of the nurses get saved, what was the point, right? That's the most important part of Christian life: soulwinning. There's very little thought that maybe the most important thing here be her spiritual strength, grace and peace from the Lord to glorify Him and grow in Christ through what God's sent. And not just her: me too.

I think another factor is our modern American life. We've grown up in a world where everything is always supposed to get better. You can't have the slightest headache without popping an aspirin. If something hurts–physically, mentally, emotionally–we want it fixed NOW. All diseases should be cured. All our children should survive childhood, and if they don't this is an exception, not the norm. We should keep all our teeth. We should have air conditioning when we're warm and heating when we're cool. We shouldn't ever be bored. We should be able to eat anything we want, no matter what season it is. We should live to be at least 80. For the most part, our "poor" would be the rich in any other time or place. We've never personally known what it's like to be invaded, to die of starvation, to have half the population die in a plague. This just isn't the way people have always thought about life, and it isn't like this outside developed countries. We're obsessed with feeling good, and that comes out in prayer request time.

[Darrell]

(02-21-2011 05:59 PM)Jenni Wrote:  I quit taking prayer requests in my classroom the day one of my students said, "Please pray for my little fish. My big fish keeps trying to eat him."

There's actually a prayer for this:

O God, you have redeemed all creation
through the incarnation of your eternal Word;
Protect our pets, your creatures,
who provide us with joy
and nonjudgmental companionship;
Give us respect
for all of your Word-redeemed creation,
that we may care for creation
as just and humble stewards;
We pray this in the name of the same Word, Jesus Christ,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever.

[Darrell]

Catholic, believe it or not: http://www.churchyear.net/pets.html

[Jenni]

(02-22-2011 02:52 AM)Historian Wrote:  We're obsessed with feeling good, and that comes out in prayer request time.

Yep. I definitely agree with this one. That's probably why we get prayer requests like, "Please pray that we make all our flights on time" and "Please pray that my dog doesn't piddle on the floor while the guests are at my home." Puh-lease. Between these kinds of prayer requests, the TMI requests, and the ones that are either gossip or bragging (let me tell you all about how I saved this kid [really, YOU saved him? Was he drowning?], so can you pray for him since I talked to him and then he got saved and I was so spiritual?) ... this is why I never, ever gave prayer requests on Wednesday nights. Actually, when I was in my IFB church I avoided Wednesday night church by working in AWANA.

[Darrell]

My favorites were always medical prayer requests.

http://www.stufffundieslike.com/2008/12/...-requests/

There was one dear lady, bless her heart, who always had to give us every single detail of every medical issue anybody in her circle of family and friends had. It was...um...educational.

[Jenn]

I had a high school teacher who really liked to take prayer requests. Once a girl in my class asked us to pray for her little brother, because he stilled had not dropped his tentacles.

[Darrell]

bwahahahaha.

[fundyvangelicalcatholic]

My favorite was a kid in my prayer group who always prayed that his grandfather would quit chewing that "yucky tabacoo". We would also pray that as well and the kid always laughed.