The Necessity of Prayer

Bounds begins by quoting a story from A.C. Dixon that parallels praying to God to a story of a little fawn running into a man's arms for protection in order to avoid an attack by dogs. (Bounds, 3) The point that is made is that by prayer happening, it causes God the listener to provide for the needs of the one praying even if it is at the expense of others (in this case the dogs would perhaps loose a meal). The appeal to God through prayer thus is shown as a appeal to his might in the face of harm, and what is suggested is that God emotionally reacts by intervening.

In regard to prayer Bounds speaks of faith as being the foundation to prayer as he references Christ praying for Peter's faith, "Our Lord was declaring a central truth; it was Peter's faith He was seeking to guard; for well He knew that when faith is broken down, the foundations of spiritual life give way, and the entire structure of religious experience falls." (Bounds, 4) The point that Bounds introduces is that faith is what gives the power to prayer; moreover, faith is what would have caused a fawn to run into the arms of a human protector when chased by dogs.

For Bounds, "Faith gives birth to prayer, and grows stronger, strikes deeper, rises higher, in the struggles and wrestlings of mighty petitioning." (Bounds, 9) The point thus to be made is that for Bounds faith is not just the foundation for prayer, but also faith is what brings prayer into existence. The idea is that in order to pray a person must first believe in the person that they are praying to.

Bounds then goes on to qualify faith by saying the following, "Yet faith is narrowed down to one particular thing -- it does not believe that God will reward everybody, nor that He is a rewarder of all who pray, but that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him." (Bounds, 12) The point made is that Bounds shows that faith in itself does not promote that everyone gets rewarded by God, but instead faith is exclusive in its meaning that those that have faith are the only ones that get rewarded for it. The fact that God is exclusive to choosing to reward those that have faith only reinforces the point.

Bounds clarifies his position by showing an example in kingship in that faith is the power whereas prayer is the secptre. (Bounds, 13) One could thus induce at this point that if Jesus prayed for the protection of the faith of Peter, then faith is managed by God. If faith then is the power behind prayer and is managed by God, then God is in control of a person's faith that by its nature produces prayer. In this cyclical relationship between God and man, God the Son would manage the faith of a human, and that human would then in turn pray to God as an appeal for God to better manage things.

One could thus suggest that faith becomes like the input that is given to mankind that believe, and prayer is like the output that the faith produces. God manages the faith, and humans try to change management practices of God by prayer coming out. If God's hands shape faith like a potter shaping clay, then prayer acts as the liveliness that the clay uses to bounce back from the molding of the master's hands.

Bounds says the following, "One might well ask, whether the feebleness of our desires for God, the Holy Spirit, and for all the fulness of Christ, is not the cause of our so little praying, and of our languishing in the exercise of prayer?" (Bounds, 20) With the previous example of God molding people like a potter molding clay, what a person could conclude from what Bounds has said is that if we are not very lively in reacting to God as clay, then he is not very lively in shaping us with his hands.

Although Bounds takes up many topics in the subject of prayer such as trust (Bounds, 14), desire (Bounds, 19), fervency (Bounds, 24), importunity (Bounds, 28), character (Bounds, 35), obedience (Bounds, 40), vigilance (Bounds, 49), the Word of God (Bounds, 54), and the house of God (Bounds, 63), the foundation for everything rests in faith. The manual of prayer that Bounds has thus made has its foundation in the idea that faith is orchestrated by God, and prayer is orchestrated by man. The question that could be raised is, "are we simply like cogs in a machine that get a predictable input and gives a predictable output, or is prayer and faith more unpredictable by God?"

Bibliography:

Bounds, Edward. The Necessity of Prayer. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Christian Classics Ethereal Library, 2000. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/bounds/necessity.html