Do You Want To Be More Like Jesus?

The Resident Advisor for my freshman wing in college was an ordained minister with the Church of God in Christ, a predominantly African-American Protestant denomination. As a result, our weekly hall meetings were a unique amalgamation of announcements and church—African-American style.

Terry Rhone challenged us in our commitment to Christ and demonstrated what a follower of Christ looked like. But one night, he left us with an adage that I will never forget.

As you read the following lines, imagine yourself sitting in an African-American church, with the minister standing at the pulpit, dressed in a minister’s robe, wiping his brow and the people fanning themselves around you. Here’s what he said:

Much prayer…much power.

Little prayer…little power.

No prayer…no power.

Scripture offers no sure-fire formulas, but this comes as close to any formula I know of.

As much as many of us avoid it…

As much as many of us talk about it but never do it…

As much as many of us talk about it, don’t do it, and convince ourselves that we are doing it…prayer takes no shortcuts.

In Mark 9, the disciples and teachers of the law were arguing over a poor, helpless boy who is described as “possessed by a spirit.” The term “possessed by a spirit” or “demon-possessed” is a terribly unfair and incorrect translation. A much better translation of this word is “demonized.” A demonized person may be harassed from the outside or from within.

The boy’s symptoms looked like epilepsy, but somehow, some way, demons were harassing him.

Before this event, Jesus had sent out his disciples under his authority. In fact, Mark 3:15 tells us that Jesus gave them “authority to drive out demons.”

Yet they couldn’t drive out this particular demon. In fact, my hunch is that the disciples’ powerlessness was the subject of their argument with the teachers of the law.

And then, with one sentence, Jesus delivered the boy from the demon.

“You deaf and mute spirit,” Jesus said, “I command you, come out of him and never enter him again” (Mark 9:25).

Later, the disciples pulled Jesus aside and asked him, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?” (Mark 9:28)

“This kind can come out only by prayer,” he replied.

But the disciples did pray for the boy.

Think back to my friend Terry’s words:

Much prayer…much power.

Little prayer…little power.

No prayer…no power.

Jesus didn’t limit his prayer life to moments when the situation demanded it. On a regular basis Jesus excused himself from his ministry to spend quality time with his heavenly Father (see Mark 1:35, 6:46, 14:32).

If you’re like me, we don’t start praying fervently until we need God’s intervention. And then when we pray, we start with something like, “God, I know I should have been praying earlier…but I really need your help right now.”

But what if we prayed fervently before we needed God to act on our behalf?

Our lives would be different—and I think we’d look and act a lot more like Jesus.

Michael co-pastors The Neighborhood Church in Littleton, Colorado with Eugene Scott. His favorite book on prayer is The Complete Works Of EM Bounds On Prayer. Portions of this post first appeared in the February 27, 2010 installment of The Neighborhood Cafe.