Juicy Problems

Pink Kitty has a new blog, and she’s talking about things I love to think on–things like prayer, intercessory prayer and the interaction of the body of fellowship.

The church community has become something of an anthropological hobby of mine, moreso lately. I’m endlessly fascinated at how the pursuit of Christlikeness impacts an ordinary gathering of human beings. Obviously no one in a church is entirely like Christ, because they are not yet dead. (It is only in death that we see face to face and are the wholly new creature we’ve spent our time on earth journeying toward.) Nevertheless, a large percentage–we hope for 100, but we’re never sure–are actively TRYING. The disconnect is when some folks focus only on the attempts, while others focus only on the failure of many of those attempts. This accounts for the big gap between the Yay Church! and the Ugh, Church! folks. It also accounts for why so many people of my generation aren’t going to church, dear Barna.

One of the saddest and most obvious gaps between the Trying and Failing is in the area of prayer requests and the response to problems. There are certain problems we’re used to hearing in prayer requests that don’t meet with much undue attention. Everyone’s uncle has had cancer, everyone’s rotator cuff has needed surgery, everyone’s kids have all gotten the flu at once. Health prayer requests are totally safe. As are (sorry, Christy) ‘travelling mercies’. Who hasn’t had a road trip to grandma’s for which they’d like a guardian angel on shotgun?

But there are prayer requests which never get asked, because as much as we like the idea of growing closer to Christ, no one likes their human counterparts to know what’s underneath the clean sheets on their bed. Who raises their hand at the beginning of Sunday School and says “I need prayer for my porn addiction” or “I’m in a dark place with my spiritual walk and would like to be lifted up”? The “juicier” the problem on a human level, the less intercessory prayer is requested. [This is also a problem I have with the Name It And Claim It teachers. As cool an idea as that may be, it also gives unscrupulous pastors--and we know those do exist--fodder for blackmail. ]

I’ve been asking for prayer for health concerns for years. Exactly ONE person from my church checks in on a regular basis to see how I’m faring, and that person is a close friend. Health concerns are mundane.

A while back I had a close friend ask for prayer regarding their marriage. People who had tenuous connections with the couple on a social basis suddenly felt it their calling to be involved in all aspects of the lives of both husband and wife. I was approached by several people at several levels in the church for progress reports. People were interested and people were taking notice. Many people confessed their own difficulties within their marriages over the years–things which were NEVER talked about at prayer request time.

It seemed to me that the more “interesting” a problem, the greater the response is on the part of the church. Some of that may be superficial curiousity, but I think on another level some of the interest in those problems we all share but never talk about is the desire to finally be able to talk about the marital problems, the porn addiction, the job struggles with other Christians without fear of gossip.