Bold Prayers That Changed My Life (part 1)

Three months ago, I was asked to speak at a small Baptist Women’s Day of Prayer event up in north Louisiana, close to where I grew up.

The lady who called to ask me to speak said that someone had given her my name. Ya’ll .. I am many things. A teacher, a writer, a lover of theology, a Bible reader. But a speaker? The truth is I have spoken before, and I am not afraid of public speaking. But I don’t really consider myself to be a speaker. I mean, if someone asked you to think of a person to come speak to your group, my name shouldn’t be the first one that comes to mind.

But, for some reason I cannot explain, even though I felt oddly inadequate and a bit perplexed about how my name came up as a possible speaker, I went ahead and accepted the invitation. After all, it was early August and the speech wouldn’t be until November. I had a lot of time to figure this thing out.

Wouldn’t you know it but the weeks flew by and suddenly it was mid-October and the speech was looming over my head! I still had no great ideas for a speech. So I did what I should have done back in August. I started praying! And the words that kept coming to mind was “bold prayers” and “praying with boldness.”

Now there are perhaps a thousand words you could use to describe me, but the chances that you would pick bold as one of those words would be slim to none. And that’s fair because the truth is I am not a bold personality. I am much more of a people-pleasing, peace-keeping sort of girl.

Yet the more I thought about it, the more I felt God impressing upon me that you don’t have to be bold-natured to pray bold prayers.

Honestly, I hate to admit this, but my prayer life isn’t usually bold either. And I reminded God of this sad fact.

That’s when He reminded me that I have prayed some bold prayers in my life. And furthermore, He pointed out that while boldness may not be an innate part of my personality make-up, it is a skill that can be learned … especially when it comes to bold praying.

So we agreed I would talk about bold prayers. Even though the last thing I felt about the whole situation was bold.

Today I gave my speech. It went well. I mean, when it was all said and done, the lady in charge invited me to eat lunch with the group, so it couldn’t have been all that bad.

On the ride back home, the idea came to me that I could turn my speech from today into a blog post series. And so that’s what I decided to do.

After all, I probably wrote this much better than I spoke it.

And now that you know the back story, here is the first of the life-changing bold prayers. Trust me, if you pray this one, it will definitely change your life.

Bold Prayer #1: Lord, Bless Me!

During the night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two slave women, and his eleven sons, and crossed the ford of Jabbok. He took them and sent them across the stream, along with all his possessions.

Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. When the man saw that he could not defeat him, he struck Jacob’s hip socket as they wrestled and dislocated his hip.  Then he said to Jacob, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”

But Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”

Genesis 32: 22-26 32:

Jacob is known for many things. In the first part of his life, he was a liar, a cheater, a swindler, a trickster.  He had also spent most of his life trying to do himself the very things that God has already promised him … and while he got all of those things, the way he went about gaining them was anything but God-honoring.

Jacob probably would have loved the old Frank Sinatra tune, “I did it my way.”

If you know the story of Jacob, you will recall that Jacob tricks his brother and his aged father into giving him a birthright. His brother Esau vows that he will kill Jacob after their father dies. At this point, Jacob runs away.

Genesis 32 picks up with Jacob traveling back home. Years upon years have passed by, but now Jacob is about to meet back up with his brother Esau – and Jacob is fearing what might happen when his brother sees him face-to-face.

Jacob is clearly worried about this meeting. He is falling back on his old methods, plotting a way to try to gain Esau’s forgiveness. He is sending gifts ahead in an effort to prepare Esau’s heart for his arrival. Jacob is also moving his people and possessions into various groups, so that not everyone will arrive at the same time or place. It’s a ploy on Jacob’s part to buy himself time.

But at some point, Jacob ends up alone in the night.

And then a man shows up and they start to wrestle.

Now we know that the man wrestling with Jacob is none other than God. 

How many of us have wrestled with God? 

Maybe you’ve been up all night praying for healing for yourself or a loved one. Maybe you were in a financial crisis or you had work problems. Maybe you are wrestling with God because you don’t understand why good people must suffer. Or why the ungodly are blessed and the godly seem to not get blessed in the same way.

Regardless of the source, we have all been there, when the weight of the world is upon us and we find ourselves wrestling with God in prayer. 

Wrestling is a tough sport. It’s hard to do it for a long time. My husband Jon was a wrestler in high school. He said his matches were about 2 minutes long, which he said felt like an eternity in the middle of the match! Olympic wrestling matches are typically broken up into two three-minute periods with a 30 second break in the middle. A strong, experienced wrestler will typically wrestle for about six and a half minutes.

But Jacob wrestled God all night. He was not giving up. 

It’s interesting to me that God was the one who called for the wrestling match to end.

Why? Was God tired? No. Was He afraid of losing? Did He need a break? Maybe He had somewhere else to go … No. No, no, no.

I don’t think it was any of those reasons. I believe God called the wrestling match off simply because it was time to stop. Morning was approaching. The night was over. It was time to quit wrestling.

If you are a parent (especially. of a preteen or teen), you might know what this is like. Your child wants something, like to extend curfew or to go to a party or to get extra privileges They are persistent about asking, providing lots of arguments in an effort to change your mind. You may put up with it for a while, entertaining their questions and pleas. But eventually you say, “Enough. We are done with this conversation.”

And I think that’s what God was doing here … He is simply telling Jacob it is time to move on. Wrestling over.

But Jacob was tenacious and bold. He said, “No. I won’t let go … not until you bless me.”

Up until this point in his life, Jacob didn’t have a track record of trusting God. He manipulated and tricked and swindled his way through life. But now, Jacob is changing tactics. By asking for God’s blessing, Jacob is admitting he cannot repair his relationship with his brother without God intervening. He is asking God to work in the situation, admitting his way will not work and he needs God to help.

Do you remember God’s response to Jacob’s request for blessing?

According to scripture, God asks him “What is your name?” 

This always struck me as an odd question. God knew exactly who Jacob was, so why did he ask this question? I think he wanted to see what Jacob said.

Jacob could have said he was Isaac’s son or Abraham’s grandson. He could have made an attempt to use their relationship with God to buy himself a blessing. But Jacob doesn’t do that. Instead, Jacob says, “I am Jacob.”

The name ‘Jacob’ itself means, ‘”heel-grabber, supplanter, trickster.” Jacob knows full well this name fits him. So even though this seems like a simple answer to God’s questions, in reality Jacob is not just stating his name, but he is admitting everything he knows to be true about himself. Stating his name is an act of confession. 

That confession frees Jacob to take on everything God has destined for him to become. 

And as an acknowledgment of the new identity to come, God baptizes Jacob with a new name: “From now on your name is no longer Jacob- but Israel.”

Now, Jacob will no longer be able to call himself “trickster” or “manipulator.”  No longer will Jacob be able to identify himself in a way that is anything other than God-like!

Can you imagine doing that in your own life? What if you were unable to identify yourself or talk about yourself in a way that was anything other than God-like?

So many times we hang on to the names and perceptions of who we are. We believe that we are nothing more than the bad ways we act or think, or the things we have done.

This sort of thinking causes us to miss the fact that God has already given us a new identity. Through Christ we leave our old identity behind and are given a new identity in Christ: Holy. Righteous. Chosen. Worthy. Loved. Heir to the Kingdom. 

Accepting these names will not be easy. Growing into a new identity never is.. That’s another wrestling part- another struggle we face in our Christian life … learning to see ourselves as God sees us.

Most likely by the time you are done learning how to step into your new Christ-given identity, you will end up with a limp, just like Jacob left his wrestling match with a limp.

But learn from Jacob.

Keep at it through the night. Don’t be afraid to wrestle with God … because when we cry out for His blessing, we are admitting our dependence on Him and boldly claiming that we believe the promises of God to be true.