This week I’ve begun reading Calvin on Prayer: from Institutes of the Christian Religion. You can get it for free here, or on Kindle for 99p. Having spent the past few days getting stuck into it I can’t think of many other things you’d get for 99p that would be better for you.
My most immediate thought is that Calvin’s surprisingly easy to read. I read some of the Institutes at university but haven’t read anything more than a few paragraphs since (lots about Calvin, but little from Calvin), and was expecting something good but heavy going. In fact it’s the opposite – broken into short sections and very readable.
My second impression is that every section is packed full of helpful thoughts. There’s profound theology, on-point exegesis and practical advice. I’ve read books with hundred of pages that have less useful theology in them than Calvin has in about 3-4 very short chapters.
Here are 13 takeaways from the first few sections. It was supposed to be from the whole book but there’s just too much in the first part, so there may be future posts as I get further into it!
I’ll just put my summary heading then quote him – he’ll say it better than me.
- A Christian not praying is illogical.
‘To know God as the sovereign disposer of all good, inviting us to present our requests, and yet not to approach or ask of Him, were so far from availing us, that it were just as if one told of a treasure were to allow it to remain buried in the ground.’ (Section 1)
2. Prayer is the first thing a believer does.
‘Hence, the Apostle, to show that a faith unaccompanied by prayer to God cannot be genuine, states this to be the order: as faith springs from the Gospel, so by faith our hearts are framed to call upon the name of God.(Romans 10:14-17) (Section 1)
3. Prayer is seeking and finding a treasure.
“To prayer, then, are we indebted for penetrating to those riches that are treasured up for us with our heavenly Father. (Section 2)
4. We pray not so much for God’s sake but for ours. Even the benefit of worshipping comes back to us.
‘But someone will say, does He not know without a monitor both what our difficulties are and what is meet for our interest, so that it seems in some measure superfluous to solicit Him by our prayers, as if he were winking, or even sleeping, until aroused by the send of our voice? Those who argue thus attend not to the end for which the Lord taught us to pray. It was not so much for His sake as for ours. He wills indeed, as is just, that due honor be paid Him by acknowledging that all that men desire or feel to be useful and pray to obtain is derived from Him. But even the benefit of the homage that we thus pay Him rebounds to ourselves.’ (Section 3).
5. Assuming that because of Divine providence we shouldn’t or don’t need to pray is ‘absurd’.
‘It is very absurd, therefore, to dissuade men from prayer, by pretending that Divine Providence, which is always watching over the government of the universes, is in vain importuned by our supplications. On the contrary, the Lord Himself declares that He is “nigh unto all that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth” (Psalm 145:18). (Section 3)
6. Prayer stops our faith from becoming ‘drowsy or torpid’ (Section 3)
7. Remember that you’re speaking to God!
‘Let the first rule of right prayer then be to have our heart and mind framed as becomes those who are entering into converse with God.’ (Section 4)
8. But, although we should ‘lay aside all carnal thoughts and cares’, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t bring the ‘gnawings of anxiety’.
‘On the contrary, it is by anxiety that the fervour of prayer is inflamed.’ (Section 4)
9. He is honest about the struggles to stay focused during prayer.
‘For no man is so intent on praying as not to feel many thoughts creeping in, either breaking off the tenor of his prayer or retarding it by some turning or digression. Here let us consider how unbecoming it is when God admits us to familiar intercourse to abuse His great condescension by mingling things sacred and profane, to abuse reverence for Him, not keeping our minds under restraint, but just as if in prayer we were conversing with one like ourselves, forgetting Him, and allowing our thoughts to run to and fro.’ (Section 5).
10. Why are we encouraged to lift up hands in prayer?
‘The ceremony of lifting up our hands in prayer is designed to remind us that we are far removed from God, unless our thoughts rise upward. As it is said in the psalm, “Unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul” (Psalms 25:1). Scripture repeatedly uses the expression to lift up our prayer (Isaiah 37:4), meaning that those who would be heard by God must not “settle on their lees” (Jeremiah 48:11). (Section 5)
11. That ancient Greeks and Romans created gods for certain things shows a selfish view of prayer, a view of prayer that is not aligned with wanting God’s will, not ours.
‘Hence it happened that the ambitious adopted Jupiter as their patron; the avaricious, Mercury; the literary aspirants, Apollo and Minerva; the warlike, Mars; the licentious, Venus.” (Section 5)
12. We should want what we are asking for
‘Another rule of prayer is that, in asking, we must always truly feel our wants, and seriously considering that we need all the things that we ask, accompany the prayer with a sincere, nay, ardent desire of obtaining them. Many repeat prayers in a perfunctory manner from a set form, as if they were performing a task to God.’ (Section 6)
‘For instance, when we pray that His name be hallowed (Luke 11:2) – that hallowing must, so to speak, be earnestly hungered and thirsted after.’ (Section 6)
13. The most godly pray-ers are the most humble pray-ers.
‘Of this submission, which casts down all haughtiness, we have numerous examples in the servants of God. The holier they are, the more humbly they prostrate themselves when they come into the presence of the Lord. Thus Daniel, on whom the Lord Himself bestowed such high commendation, says, “We do not present our supplications before thee for our righteousness, but for they great mercies. O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, hearken and do; defer not, for thine own sake, O my God: for thy city and they people are called by thy name.” (Daniel 9:18-19)
Mostly Clear Thinking 
Leave a comment