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“Lord, bless me and my wife,
my son, and his wife,
us four,
no more,
Amen.”

Modern Christian prayers can easily slide into the trap of becoming all about me and my needs, rather than about God, or about the community in which He has placed us.

In sharp contrast, Hebraic prayer focuses on the corporate over the individual.

The Disciples Prayed Corporately

“Now, Lord, look on their threats, and grant to Your servants that with all boldness they may speak Your word…” (Acts 4:29)

In this teaching series, we have noted how the disciples in Acts 4:23-31 followed a very Jewish style of prayer. Facing threats and persecution, they nonetheless started their prayer by focusing their attention on God’s greatness. Next, we found that they prayed the Scriptures and specifically the Psalms about their situation, following classic Hebraic patterns for prayer.

In this third part of our series, we can notice that the disciples’ prayer was not so much about them as individuals, as it was about the whole group of believers together. This is a common feature of Hebraic prayer – in fact, most Hebrew prayers are written in the plural and typically require the presence of at least 10 men (in what is called a minyan). We similarly see this corporate pattern of prayer represented in the Lord’s Prayer: “Our Father…”, “give us this day our daily bread…”, “forgive us our sins…”… etc.

By praying in the plural, the disciples remind themselves that they are part of a wider community and avoid being consumed by their own private problems.

Beneath this concept of corporate prayer, lies a traditional Jewish understanding that believers are not only responsible for their own personal walk of faith, but are also responsible for each other within the community. Being part of a community and looking out for each other therefore becomes an integral, non-negotiable part of life as a believer.

Sadly, many believers today struggle to find their place in a congregation. Many have been hurt by fellow Christians, while others have become isolated by divisions over doctrines. In his classic book The Final Quest, Rick Joyner paints a picture of a group of Christian prisoners of the enemy. He writes, “Occasionally, a weak prisoner would stumble and fall. As soon as he or she hit the ground, the other prisoners would begin stabbing them with their swords, scorning them as they did so.”

Sadly, this has often been the response of Christians to the apparent shortcomings of fellow believers. Instead of seeing the welfare of our fellow believers as, in part, our responsibility, we have on many occasions been too quick to condemn and attack fellow believers for their mistakes.

Desiring the Power of God

“And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken;
and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness.” (Acts 4:31)

After the disciples prayed together, corporately, in unity and as one, the power of the Holy Spirit fell afresh on their group. Many of us today desire the same power encounters with God, but it all begins as we as believers gather in unity, seeking Him together as a body. In order for this to happen, we need to value the importance of being together as a community, and secondly, we may need to work on our relationships to overcome past issues.

In our next and final instalment on this series on Hebraic prayer, we are going to look at conforming to God’s will.

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Image courtesy of Adobe.