The Grace of Persistent, Long-Haul Prayer – Brad Jersak

Three Sisters — Canmore, Alberta

Recently in beautiful Canmore, Alberta, I got into a conversation with my friend Mark Maxwell. He’s a wise man who thinks and feels deeply—a person whose words I often hang on. The following content represents our conversation… though credit goes to him for patiently guiding me through the issue of long-haul prayer.

Luke 11

And [Jesus] said to them, “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him’; and he will answer from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed. I cannot get up and give you anything’? I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence he will rise and give him whatever he needs.

And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

Why Persistence Matters

In the above Jesus’ teaching on prayer, he speaks about the importance of persistence. Somehow it matters. And yet at the same time, his illustration includes a contrast where God is most assuredly not like the sleepy friend or the good father but far less reluctant and far more generous. But at the same time, Jesus seems to be speaking to a reality we experience—even in the benevolence of God, some prayers take a long time to see answered. And in those cases, persistence matters.

One reason persistence matters when we set ourselves to prayer (say, over the course of years) is that the waiting itself is a grace that forms us. For example, imagine imploring God for a specific outcome over the course of three years. And let’s assume we’ve grown to a point where we’re convinced God is not hard of hearing or reluctant to bless. Then why the delay? And let’s assume further that I’m seeking something truly good, with right motives, and am quite sure God has made it clear that the request is within God’s will. Yet still the delay. What’s up? Perhaps over time, we have even let go of the outcome and surrendered our desires to God’s loving care. Were those prayers fruitless? I don’t think so.

Outcomes Versus Fruit

Here, I’m suggesting a distinction between “answered prayers” as expected outcomes and the “good fruit” of our deepening spiritual formation and/or the ripening required for the best outcome. In the former case, rather than serving my desires as an over-responsive helicopter parent, God may be working something in my heart (e.g., the discipline of patient endurance or deepening trust or stable character) that requires focused time in prayer regardless of the outcome). In the latter case, God may be responding to my need but the moving parts and other partners involve a complexity that takes time and human participation, even if things are set in motion immediately. By the time it all comes together, the formation in me and the fruit of the answered prayer may be far more beautiful than by quick trip through the prayer drive-thru could manage in the short term I wished it was.

What if not one second is wasted as every moment in prayer is relational proximity to divine grace and bears the transforming effects of conscious time spent with God’s Living Presence? And what if all those invocations and desires and the long hours of seeking lead to the promised outcome: the good gifts our hearts are yearning for beyond altering external consequences (however good we believe them to be).

Soggy Root Balls

Mark offered two examples of how my impatience in prayer misunderstands the importance of spiritually healthy patience.

First, his mother reported the death of another tree in their yard. They wanted to get to the bottom of what had destroyed an otherwise healthy plant. Wisely, they dug up the root ball and took it to a local horticulturalist. He looked at it in shock… the thing was a ball of mush. What on earth was wrong? Apparently, someone had thought to surround the trunk with a soaker hose and grossly over-watered it, drowning a tree that knew perfectly well how to dig deep into the soil for all the moisture and nutrients it would ever need. It struck me as comical to listen to the story as I gazed out on a mountainside forest with nary a soaker hose on the horizon.

Water-Stressed Vines

The second example was similar. Mark had visited a vineyard where, to his eyes, the vines appeared to be suffering under the scorching sun. “These vines need to be watered!” he said. His brother replied, “Not so. Yes, vines need water, but if they are over-irrigated, it dilutes the flavor and produce vigorous foliage at the expense of fruit quality. ‘Water stress’ encourages the roots to grow deeper in search of moisture, penetrating the rock, and that struggle produces smaller, more concentrated fruit. The vines still need water, but without that struggle they won’t produce the sweetest grapes.”

The Scent of Water

Another analogy comes from Job 14:7-9, transposed from its context:

“For there is hope for a tree,
if it is cut down, that it will sprout again
and that its shoots will not cease.
Though its root grows old in the earth
and its stump dies in the ground,
yet at the scent of water it will bud
and put forth branches like a young plant.”

I like instant answers to prayer. And I’d like to believe God loves to respond quickly when that brings about the best outcome. But if prayer is about more than getting the good things we want or need, the grace of persisting and even insisting may form us as deeper and healthier plants that produce sweeter fruit that cannot come about at the snap of praying fingers.

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