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What counts is knowing who you want to be and asking for it
I totally disagree with this statement, since when has the Christian life been about what we want rather than what God wants and has in mind for us? The author suggests that we can access God's blessings by ritually praying certain words connected to Jabez, a little known Bible character. He even tells a story about someone seemingly on a tour of heaven wh
I got as far as page 20 in this "Christian" best seller, then I read the followingWhat counts is knowing who you want to be and asking for it
I totally disagree with this statement, since when has the Christian life been about what we want rather than what God wants and has in mind for us? The author suggests that we can access God's blessings by ritually praying certain words connected to Jabez, a little known Bible character. He even tells a story about someone seemingly on a tour of heaven who finds a box of blessings that they didn't ask for and therefore didn't receive. If we follow this thread to its logical conclusion, we would spend every waking minute listing all of the possible blessings we can think of in case God has one of them in store for us that might be missed if we don't speak it into existence.....
This book is another method approach to spirituality yet in reality there are no short-cuts (http://christianmissionaryuk.blogspot...)
The author claims to have lived a blessed life since beginning to pray this prayer but how can he possibly know whether his blessings can be attributed to this prayer or not? The Bible makes it clear that good things/blessings will fall on the righteous and wicked alike....
Don't waste your time with this. It is little different to casting spells or speaking positive words over someone or saying abracadabra. Unbelievable once again that Christians buy into this stuff.....Please just read your Bible and pray every day, it is a discipline, one that cannot be mastered in just under an hour or in less than 100 pages of incantations....
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"For Wilkinson, the prayer of Jabez has become the secret to success in every endeavor. God is viewed as a butler who responds in a mechanical manner when certain words are recited."
The book m
I read this book about 10 or 12 years ago when my pastor at the time gave me a copy to read. At that time it seemed like everyone in the church was into Jabez and the book was passing hands like hot potatoes... but I guess I was a bit the odd ball because I just didn't like it. As one author put it so well:"For Wilkinson, the prayer of Jabez has become the secret to success in every endeavor. God is viewed as a butler who responds in a mechanical manner when certain words are recited."
The book makes a mountain of presumption out of a little verse in the Bible and then suggests that if a person is not enjoying massive material prosperity in their life, then they have not learned the proper method of praying like Jabez. Sigh...
I found it kinda funny that for thousands of years, no one ever seemed to have heard of Jabez among Christians... I certainly don't remember reading about him growing up in church world... but then, all of the sudden, we're supposed to believe that THIS is the be-all end-all key to financial prosperity in life for every Christian...
Another author in response this book wrote a little book of his own called "The Prayer of Jesus" to which I chuckled because it was obvious that author was annoyed with the Jabez fad as well. When the disciples of Jesus came to Him and asked Him how they should pray, He didn't tell them to go look up Jabez in the scroll and pray like that! Furthermore, Jesus didn't tell them to beg for prosperity. He said to simply pray that God would give them their daily bread and keep them from evil.
The opening statement in the book says: "I want to teach you how to pray a daring prayer that God ALWAYS answers... I believe it contains the key to a life of extraordinary favor with God..."
Wow! Always answers? Really? Are you sure? Funny that a prayer so critically important that God is ALWAYS obligated to answer doesn't appear ANYWHERE else in Scripture and which God NEVER once commanded anyone on planet earth to pray! God's ways are much higher than our ways and certainly His path doesn't always make immediate sense to us. Jesus, as a matter of fact, told us that in this life it was a guarantee that we would suffer and even that we would be hated by many just because we followed Him. He also prayed for His followers and asked that the Father not take them out of the world to escape from suffering, but to keep them through it. The apostle Paul talked about suffering hardship, sickness and poverty but still counting it all joy. The apostles repeatedly taught that we should be content with what we have and not greedy. Yet, somehow, Mr. Wikinson, ignores all this instruction and instead teaches that if you pray a rote prayer (the exact same prayer, verbatim from Jabez), every day, over and over, that God must grant you prosperity!
Strange... Did he forget that Jesus said (in Matthew 6:7):
"And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words."
Seems Scripture actually indicates that this is exactly NOT the way to get your prayers answered.
Where is the humility in all this? Where is the realization of God's sovereignty? Where is the trust that God's ways don't always make immediate sense to us and we may have to endure hardship on our path? That doesn't mean God doesn't love us or that we're not praying right...
What really annoys me about this book is that Wilkinson says that THIS prayer is THE KEY to a life of extraordinary favor with God.... Has this guy ever heard of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? God's favor is not poured out on us because we commit rote prayers. It's given because HE CHOOSES TO out of His own good purposes! God showed the most extraordinary favor of all when He gave His Son on Calvary's Cross! What more extraordinary kind of favor could there be? God forgiving ALL the sins of mankind and taking ALL of their punishment upon Himself!!! THINK ABOUT THIS!!!! Such amazing love and unbelievable (totally unmerited) favor! NOT BECAUSE OF ANYTHING ANY OF US DID!!!! Who in the world is this knucklehead to suggest that praying the words of some obscure mention of a dude named Jabez in the Old Testament over and over, day after day, is THE key above all keys to God's favor? To me this is absolutely disgusting to even suggest and I tend to believe that only a person who has not truly experienced a revelation of the Gospel by the Holy Spirit would dare even think such a thing!
I also remember reading several Roman Catholic publications at the time that Jabez was so popular and Catholic leaders were commenting that they were encouraged by the Protestant excitement over the prayer of Jabez because, while Protestant Christians have long criticized Catholics for the futility of rote praying (i.e. the Rosary, etc.), now suddenly they were all jumping on board as though this was God's ultimate will for the whole world! So Catholics were actually praising Protestants for coming on board with long-held Roman Catholic mindsets concerning prayer!!!
This book was a TOTAL turn off for me! Still is! Hey look... I'm glad things worked out awesome for Jabez. God is good and He loves to bless His people. It's cool to know that God blessed this man... but that doesn't make one little passage a blanket command or guaranteed result for everyone who copies the same prayer and repeats it rote hoping to get whatever they crave! The book The Prayer of Jabez, in my opinion, is basically just a form of Christian witchcraft. Sorry, but that's how I see it.
Maybe the prayer of Jesus isn't quite as interesting for some, but the spirit of those words Jesus spoke as an example for us have always produced blessing in my life... and I'm not talking about rote prayers of the prayer of Jesus either. I believe Jesus simply gave us an example of how our heart should be in approach to God. Humility, simplicity, hope, forgiveness, praise, thanksgiving and faithfulness...
The following (in closing) is the Lord's prayer from the Message paraphrase. How different is the heart of this prayer from Wilkinson's Jabez concept:
Matthew 6:6-13 - (Jesus said) "Here's what I want you to do: Find a quiet, secluded place so you won't be tempted to role-play before God. Just be there as simply and honestly as you can manage. The focus will shift from you to God, and you will begin to sense his grace. The world is full of so-called prayer warriors who are prayer-ignorant. They're full of formulas and programs and advice, peddling techniques for getting what you want from God. Don't fall for that nonsense. This is your Father you are dealing with, and he knows better than you what you need. With a God like this loving you, you can pray very simply. Like this: Our Father in heaven, Reveal who you are. Set the world right; Do what's best-- as above, so below. Keep us alive with three square meals. Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others. Keep us safe from ourselves and the Devil. You're in charge! You can do anything you want! You're ablaze in beauty! Yes. Yes. Yes.
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"Oh that you would bless me indeed,
and enlarge my territory,
that Your hand would be with me,
and that You would keep me from evil,
that I may not cause pain!"
So God granted him what he requested.
This is a verse in the New King James Version of the Bible from 1 Chronicles 4:10. It seems almost misplaced with the more than 500 names of the Hebrew family tree. Bruce Wilkinson explains that Jabez means "pain." Name meanings were a big thing in Jabez's t
And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying,"Oh that you would bless me indeed,
and enlarge my territory,
that Your hand would be with me,
and that You would keep me from evil,
that I may not cause pain!"
So God granted him what he requested.
This is a verse in the New King James Version of the Bible from 1 Chronicles 4:10. It seems almost misplaced with the more than 500 names of the Hebrew family tree. Bruce Wilkinson explains that Jabez means "pain." Name meanings were a big thing in Jabez's time. A person's name defined him. Jabez wanted what God did in his life to define him, not his name.
Bruce Wilkinson explains the verse, line by line.
Oh that you would bless me indeed - It's not wrong to ask for God to bless you the way He wants to bless you. Jabez didn't ask God to bless him with specific things, he just asked to be blessed. This is not being selfish, it's asking God to give you all He has for you.
And enlarge my territory - Jabez wanted a bigger "territory" so he could do more for God. He knew he was born for more than just being known as one who caused pain. When our territory gets bigger we are reaching more people for God.
That Your hand would be with me - Jabez knew he needed to depend on God to be able to do things for Him. Having God's hand on your life is having God's presence and power. Jabez wanted to be directed by God.
And that You would keep me from evil - Jabez knew that with all of God's blessings he might fall into temptation of thinking how great he was. Also, because we are doing what God wants us to do, the devil is going to try to stop us, by sending evil our way.
This book can be misinterpreted very easily. People think that by praying this prayer that they will be blessed with every desire of their heart. The truth is that you will, if you are praying the way God would have you pray. Our goal in life should be to lead others to the saving grace of God that we found. If we are loving God with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, and all our strength like the Bible says, then we will pray Jabez's prayer the way it is intended.
I have been praying this prayer daily for more than ten years because I want live the life God has planned for me and not miss out on any blessings from Him. I want all I do to be directed by God and not let evil keep me from doing all I can for God. You have to read through this book a few times to fully understand what the verse is all about. I would recommend this book for everyone. Check out this book and see how this seemingly misplaced verse can change your prayer life.
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Wilkinson is the biggest faux-scholar moron
This is pretty much the worst book I've ever read. I would've give it zero stars but then it would look like I didn't rate it. This book highlights what is wrong with modern American Christianity. "Dear God, please make me rich..." What a bunch of crap, and yes I read the entire thing. Prayer of Jabez serves a very big purpose in my life: I shoved it under the front of an old bookshelf so that it won't tip over forward, dumping out all of my good books.Wilkinson is the biggest faux-scholar moron who's ever been published. Feel free to talk to me if you ever want my unabridged and uncensored thoughts.
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Instead I found a book written by someone who has a deep walk with God and who is committed to helping others develop a relationship with Him.
When discussing the part of the prayer of Jabez that asks God to expand his territory, the emphasis was on asking God to expand your ministry, not on expanding your stuff.
Overall, I found thi
For years I've put off reading this book because I thought it was just a prosperity message: "Pray this prayer, and you'll get everything you want!" But I was wrong.Instead I found a book written by someone who has a deep walk with God and who is committed to helping others develop a relationship with Him.
When discussing the part of the prayer of Jabez that asks God to expand his territory, the emphasis was on asking God to expand your ministry, not on expanding your stuff.
Overall, I found this book to be very inspirational and motivating. I recommend it to anyone who wants to deepen their walk with God.
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And Wilkinson did not necessarily say life will be peaches and puppies afterwards. He said God will prune you to make you bear more fruit (not sure how his exegesis of Joh
It's easy to beat up Wilkinson this book. And maybe one should. I won't, though. Others have done it more thoroughly than I. For all of the silliness this book spawned, Wilkinson did catch on a real truth that many of his detractors missed: when you pray, you better pray in faith as though, wild thought it be, God will answer.And Wilkinson did not necessarily say life will be peaches and puppies afterwards. He said God will prune you to make you bear more fruit (not sure how his exegesis of John 15 really holds up).
The problem is that the average Evangelical is going to get a hold of this book and treat it like a literal magic lamp.
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The challenge is, since God is no respecter of persons, and if we come to him with a heart, like Jabez, to see him work in our lives for His purposes-- pray the prayer everyday for a month and see how God may move in our own lives. I say, what has anyone got to lose? Prayer can't hurt anyone. It is not about giving God a laundry list of our "wants" and expecting Him to fulfill it like our up-in-the-sky genie, but more about thinking outside of the box and allowing God to do what He wants in our lives and see where He wants to take us. I like to keep this little book on my nightstand with my Bible and devotional and remind myself of how good God is. : ) ...more
He goes on to break down the prayer into four parts and talk about each part and how to apply it in our lives. He had some good thoughts and insights. Sometimes I felt like he reached too far and assumed too much, but it was a nice message overall. Some things that stand out to me are the idea of praying for more responsibilities, more opportunities to grow, more ways to help people, and recognizing that we can only do those things with his help. If we are not depending on God very much in our lives, maybe we are keeping things too safe. Maybe we need to stretch ourselves to the point that we need his help. He will provide opportunities for growth and also the help that we need to achieve that. It is kind of a scary thought to step out into doing things that are too hard for us to do alone, but I can see the wisdom in that.
I also liked his thoughts on praying to keep us away from evil. I hadn't thought about it, but generally I would pray to be strong in the face of temptations and to withstand evil, but I hadn't really thought about praying to just keep evil and temptation far away from me so I don't even have to deal with it. Sounds nice. So while I didn't agree with every word, I did find some things that inspired me and got me thinking.
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3 December 2011
Okay, this is a very short book, but I tell you what, you can get more out of watching paint dry than actually reading this book. Somehow I get the impression that Wilkinson prayed the prayer in this book, decided to then write a book about how it works, and made a mint doing so. In these days of instant gratification a small book that takes five minutes to read is going to be much more popular than a book that actually addresses issues
How to butcher the Bible with one easy verse3 December 2011
Okay, this is a very short book, but I tell you what, you can get more out of watching paint dry than actually reading this book. Somehow I get the impression that Wilkinson prayed the prayer in this book, decided to then write a book about how it works, and made a mint doing so. In these days of instant gratification a small book that takes five minutes to read is going to be much more popular than a book that actually addresses issues but takes a week.
The book looks at a single verse in the bible (which is always a bad thing to start with) and from it develops a whole theology which is barely biblical. Okay, God answers prayers, but not necessarily this type of prayer. The verse, 1 Chronicles 4:10, simply says that a man, Jabez, asked God to enlarge his tent, and God did. For this Wilkinson suddenly decides that God will give us everything we ask. Well, unfortunately that is not always the case, and God has his own plans and purposes for us. Give me more money so I can live a more luxurious life. Sometimes that prayer is answered, other times it is not.
Personally, I can't give any perfect formula on answered prayer just as I can't give any perfect formula for getting things out of your boss. To be blunt, if we turn prayer into a method of conjuring success then all of the sudden prayer ceases to be prayer. Consider this, Goodreads says that by reading this book we discover how we can unlock God's miraculous power. That is making God sound like some magic geanie in a bottle that will grant us three wishes (or even more). Yes, God does love to shower us with gifts, but sometimes that gift is a brain tumor. In fact a gift ceases to truly be a gift when we ask for it. If I say to my mum 'I want that DVD for Christmas' and she gets it, is it truly a gift? I ask her for DVDs all the time, why is the DVD at Christmas any different? To me, it is the gifts that we don't ask for that are the more precious.
Also get this verse, Jesus suggests that worldly fathers would not give a child a scorpion if the child asks for an egg. Now, we might believe what we are asking for is an egg, but in reality it is a scorpion. It sort of reminds me of some girls that I have liked. I asked God to pave the way so that I might get together with this girl, and then cried when God said no. Later I look back on it and realise now that the girl was going to be bad news. Hey, during one of those encounters I even read this book, and praying the Jabez prayer to get this girl didn't work either.
Look, prayer cannot put confined to a book that is more of a self help guide to riches and prosperity. Prayer is communication and relation building with God. Okay, we may ask God for a lot of things, but how often do we pause to say thankyou? Even when things seem really bad, how often do we pause and actually think of the good things that are happening. Let us not turn prayer into some mystical formula for self-gratification, and return it to that heart felt act of talking with God.
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All in all, definitely not anywhere near the extreme prosperity, name it and claim it teachings.
Not bad at all. Finally read this short book which has polarized the Christian community a number if years ago. I can see why many see its principles as basically an Americanized 'bless me' teaching but that would be unfair to the author. Yes it does deal much with personal blessing but the heart behind it is for the glory of God through God using us and 'enlarging our borders'.
All in all, definitely not anywhere near the extreme prosperity, name it and claim it teachings.
Not bad at all. ...more
6: "ask God for the world"
Preface7: Jabez's prayer is one sentence with four partsChapter 1: Little Prayer, Giant Prize
9: Wilkinson went to seminary in Dallas
9-10: a gimper is someone who goes beyond expectations
13: Jabez appears as a brie Picked up a cheap copy somewhere. In his review of this book, Doug Wilson says that it's not as bad as many people say. He's right. There's not even a whisper of materialism here; it's certainly no "name it and claim it" book. Tim Challies's review is just bad.
6: "ask God for the world"
Preface7: Jabez's prayer is one sentence with four partsChapter 1: Little Prayer, Giant Prize
9: Wilkinson went to seminary in Dallas
9-10: a gimper is someone who goes beyond expectations
13: Jabez appears as a brief story in the middle of a genealogy
13-14: 1 Chronicles 4:9-10: "Now Jabez was more honorable than his brothers, and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, 'Because I bore him in pain.' And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, 'Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain!' So God granted him what he requested."
14-15: things started badly for Jabez, but they ended wellChapter 2: So Why Not Ask?
19: asking God to bless you is not selfish
21: importance of names
23: "To bless in the biblical sense means to ask for or to impart supernatural favor."
24-25: your life will become marked by miracles
25/27: the catch is that you have to ask (cf. p. 76)Chapter 3: Living Large for God
30: enlarge my territory = give me more responsibility and opportunity to serve
37: pray for "Jabez appointments"
40: God's power often works through usChapter 4: The Touch of Greatness
49: surrendering and dependence are the paths to greatness (see p. 61: dependence is power)
53: we ought to be able to say, "God did that, nobody else!"
54: progression of the requests—more blessing, more territory, more supernatural power
61: it's up to you [:/]Chapter 5: Keeping the Legacy Safe
63: more success means more opportunity for failure
67: don't ask God for power just to endure temptation—ask Him to keep you from temptation (cf. p. 75: ask for safety)
69-70: our wisdom, experience, and feelings will fail us
70: deep grief comes from the failure that follows success (cf. p. 85); "Do we really understand how far the American Dream is from God's dream for us?"Chapter 6: Welcome to God's Honor Roll
77: it would be a shame to find out that God had wanted to bless us more, but we wouldn't let him [:/]
84: prayer as secondary causation [my charitable reading]Chapter 7: Making Jabez Mine
86: Wilkinson suggests praying this prayer every day (and even rereading this book once a week for a month)
89: ask God to help you reach the world, since it's already His ...more
The Prayer of Jabez:
Breaking Through to the Blessed Life
By Bruce H. Wilkinson
Published in 2000, less than 100 pages.
THE PRAYER OF JABEZ - is just another scheme to bilk gullible Christians. Avoid the book in all it forms.
"For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear."
II Timothy 4:3 (The Bible)
"Putting too much weight on a one-sente
. The Prayer of Jabez:
Breaking Through to the Blessed Life
By Bruce H. Wilkinson
Published in 2000, less than 100 pages.
THE PRAYER OF JABEZ - is just another scheme to bilk gullible Christians. Avoid the book in all it forms.
"For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear."
II Timothy 4:3 (The Bible)
"Putting too much weight on a one-sentence prayer that is never expanded upon elsewhere in Scripture is fraught with dangers; not the least of which is reading personal biases into Scripture."
— Hank Hanegraaff (Christian Research Institute)
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Don't bother, forget it, it's not worth reading. There is far too much "prosperity" heresy (aka, prosperity theology) out there all ready.
God is NOT a cosmic vending machine. Put in the correct "coin" (prayer, words or repetition etc) and you can choose to have anything you want . . .
You will do far better reading the book, "The Cult of Jabez: And the Falling Away of the Church in America" by Pastor Steve Hopkins.
Also, a great read is The Lord's Prayer, either read or recited with sincerity.
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Let's focus first on the positive aspects of "Jabez". "The Prayer of Jabez" is a call to prayer, and it encourages the reader to pray. This, in itself, is a very good thing. Often I am amazed at the attitude of some Evangelical Ch
"The Prayer of Jabez" is one of the most successful books ever published by an Evangelical Christian minister. While there are a few minor good things that this book brings to the table, overall it is a work of terrible theology that leads to an even worse spirituality.Let's focus first on the positive aspects of "Jabez". "The Prayer of Jabez" is a call to prayer, and it encourages the reader to pray. This, in itself, is a very good thing. Often I am amazed at the attitude of some Evangelical Christians, who believe that an active prayer life is a symptom of "works righteousness," and they cite Jesus' admonition in the gospels to not pray as the pagans do by multiplying words and praying at streetcorners for public effect. While Jesus is warning us against some of the pitfalls of an active prayer life, He would never have discouraged his followers to pray. Jesus Himself prayed often, and the gospels say that sometimes he spent all night in prayer. He went to the Mount of the Transfiguration to pray, and he prayed at the Garden of Gethsemane. I would even go so far as to say that without an active prayer life, no Christian can remain in the faith. He may be able to keep up appearances, but a real Christian life is only possible with an active prayer life. And at least Wilkinson does encourage his readers in that regard. I do find it interesting, however, that Wilkinson would encourage his readers to pray this prayer verbatim every day for 30 days. That pattern is very close to the Catholic tradition of the novena, where a person prays the same prayer every day for nine days in the hopes of achieving something. Is Wilkinson trying to start a tradition like the novena among Evangelical Protestants? Catholics can abuse the novena by seeing it as a "tit for tat" arrangement with God – ie God has to give me what I ask for because I prayed the novena for it. And "Jabez" devotees can fall into the same trap, and should be cautioned about this.
Aside from that, the rest of the "Prayer of Jabez" is very bad and should be avoided at all costs. Why do I say this? I could write my own book that is twice as long as Wilkinson's 95 page essay in explaining why, but here I'll suffice it to bring up a couple of points. First, this book could just as easily be called "The Prayer of Narcissus". It is built on rank selfishness and caters to the reader's desires for wealth, power and comfort. If Ayn Rand were to write a book on Christian spirituality, it would have probably been very similar to "The Prayer of Jabez." This is very bad.
To illustrate, let's examine the four petitions of the Jabez prayer. These come from 1 Chronicles 4:9-10, a very very short passage of scripture that contains all that we know about Jabez. The four peitiions are 1) "That You would bless me indeed", 2) that You would enlarge my territory, 3) that your hand would be with me, and 4) that you would keep me from evil. So, essentially, Jabez is praying for happiness, wealth, success and an easy life. Hey, who doesn't want these things? But let's contrast that prayer with the best Christian prayer, the one that Jesus Himself gave to us, and the one that we call the "Lord's Prayer". There are seven petitions in the Lord's Prayer, 1) Our Father, who art in heaven, blessed be thy name, 2) thy kingdom come, 3) thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, 4) give us this day our daily bread, 5) and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, 6) and lead us not into temptation, 7) but deliver us from evil. There are several strong contrasts that we see between the prayer of Jabez and the Lord's prayer. First, consider that the Lord's prayer does not contain any occurrences of the first person singular pronoun. There is no "I", "me", "my" or "mine" in the Lord's prayer. The Lord's prayer focuses the first 3 petitions on God, that He be glorified and obeyed, and the last 4 petitions are about what we should want as a collective Christian community. The prayer of Jabez is all about me, me, me. The Lord's Prayer is about the entire community, and about God Himself. Consider the following contrasts – the first petiion of the prayer of Jabez asks that I be blessed while the first petition of the Lord's prayer asks that the name of the Lord be blessed. The second petition of the prayer of Jabez asks that God would enlarge my territory, while the second petition of the Lord's prayer asks that the Lord's kingdom come. The third petition of the prayer of Jabez asks that the Lord's hand be with me, while the third petition of the Lord's prayer asks that the Lord's will be done. Finally the fourth petition of the prayer of Jabez asks that I not have to suffer, while the seventh petition of the Lord's prayer asks that we be delivered from the works of Satan. Do you see the contrast? In many ways, the Prayer of Jabez turns the Lord's prayer on its head. While the Lord's prayer focuses on glorifying God and preserving the Church, the prayer of Jabez asks for personal blessings. When Jesus taught us to pray, He wanted us to focus on God and each other. The prayer of Jabez tells us to think only of ourselves.
Another problem with "Jabez" is the author's skewed interpretation of the Jabez passages. Let's look at 1 Chronicles 4:9 – 10 and see what it says, "And Jabez was more honorable than his brethren: and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, Because I bare him with sorrow. And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my border, and that thy hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it be not to my sorrow! And God granted him that which he requested." This passage uses a tremendous amount of irony, and unfortunately not everyone can pick up on ironic meanings in the scripture, especially those who are literalistically inclined. But in the first verse, Jabez receives his name because he caused his mother sorrow. So, ironically, Jabez spends his life trying to avoid sorrow. But consider that the passage describes Jabez as more honorable than his brethren. Wilkinson interprets this to mean that God bestowed honor on Jabez because of the Jabez prayer, but this is not at all apparent from the scripture. What does it mean in the Old Testament to be honorable? To determine this, let's look at other men in the Old Testament who were honorable. There was Moses, who brought the people out of Egypt and led them through 40 years in the desert. There was Joshua, who defeated the armies of many nations in order to give the land to Israel. And there was David, who defeated all of his enemies and ushered in the golden age of Israel. These are men who defeated armies, who shaped history and who did amazing things because of God's grace. So what did Jabez do? If Jabez was more honorable than his brothers, then why do we know nothing at all about him? Perhaps it's because of what we learn in Jabez's prayer, that he was self-centered, that he wanted wealth and ease and didn't want to be bothered with the things that great men do. That's the irony of the whole passage. And, again, Wilkinson turns it on its head by transforming Jabez from a man who squandered his honor into a great hero of narcissism.
Perhaps one day theologians and historians from a future age will see the "Prayer of Jabez" for what it is, the vile fruit of an empty Christianity. When future generations want to know why the Church of today is so powerless and impotent, perhaps they will see from this book that we wanted too much to be like Jabez, that 5 million of us bought this book and decided that we would rather spend our lives building our little castles in the sand than fighting the evils of our day and proclaiming the gospel to an increasingly pagan society. Aside from providing this evidence, I see very little value in reading "The Prayer of Jabez".
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Opening line of the book: "I want to teach you how to pray a daring prayer that God always answers." ….. Well that's a bold statement.
Now I'm not going to bash this book by any means. There's some good stuff in it. Before I delve into my ambivalence of this book, let's start with the points that encouraged me.
The Prayer of Jabez focuses on a single p
A friend recommended this book to me, knowing that prayer has always been a struggle for me. So I thought I'd give this short book (92 pages) a go.Opening line of the book: "I want to teach you how to pray a daring prayer that God always answers." ….. Well that's a bold statement.
Now I'm not going to bash this book by any means. There's some good stuff in it. Before I delve into my ambivalence of this book, let's start with the points that encouraged me.
The Prayer of Jabez focuses on a single prayer in 1 Chronicles 4:10, "And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, 'Oh, that You would bless me indeed and enlarge my territory, that your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain!' So God granted him what he requested."
Things that encouraged me:
-Wilkinson states that for many believers, our prayers are not big enough. That we tend to limit God with our small prayers. This I know I am guilty of. The entire book encourages the reader to pray for blessings (not material things) because God wants to bless us.
-I enjoyed the chapter where he elaborated on the "enlarge my territory" part of the prayer. It encouraged me to pray for more ministry opportunities wherever I am and wherever I go.
Now the things I was iffy on.
-The book looks only at a single verse in the Bible, which for me is always a red warning flag because it ultimately leads to bad theology.
- Stating that God is always going to answer a prayer is dangerous. The opening statement of the book made me weary from the beginning. Now I could get more on board with Wilkinson if he stated something along the lines of "praying this prayer will bring you closer to God and help you see what He has planned for you," instead of saying that, "God is always going to answer this prayer."
-Lastly, (this is me just being a little persnickety) I don't understand why this is a book. I think it'd be better as an essay. Even though, while a short read, it was filled with unnecessary "fluff" writing.
Overall, do I regret reading this? No. Did I enjoy it? Yes, parts of it. Would I recommend it? Maybe.
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Posted by: julianasailse017643.blogspot.com
Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/103610.The_Prayer_of_Jabez
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