Perspectives: The prayers of a seldom-praying nation availeth little

The National Day of Prayer for this year has come and gone. It's time we investigated the whole concept a bit further.

I don't have anything against such a "National Day..." Any time God's people get together to praise and thank, to confess and intercede, all the better. But the issue, which is addressed precious little these days, lies further on.

E. Stanley Jones, the late Methodist missionary to India, once said, "Where there is no effective prayer life, the heart of religion has ceased to beat and ... becomes a dead body of forms and customs and dogmas." And yet the vast majority of lay and clergy alike don't practice a consistent and daily habit of prayer and thus fall as casualties before the admonition of James: "The prayers of a righteous man availeth much." Righteousness is a matter of God's grace, and prayer is one of the chief means of that grace.

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