Sometimes prayer can feel stilted and routine, a bit like we are checking items off a checklist rather than speaking to the Living God. Our prayers follow the same form, even the same flow of words. While there is benefit to a pattern and consistency of form of prayer, prayer must also be full of life and not a droning monotony. After all, we would not like it if our friends and loved ones always spoke to us exactly the same every day!
Passages like Nehemiah 9 help refresh our approach to prayer. This prayer, with its focus on God as Creator and redeemer, and covenantal king, and substantial personal and corporate confession of sin, helps us to orient our prayer away from a shopping list of wants and needs.
The prayer of Nehemiah 9 comes at the end of the first celebration of the Feast of Booths in many years. After finding joy in God’s strength and remembering God’s faithfulness to their ancestors in the wilderness, God’s People gathered again in Jerusalem.
This time they gathered wearing sackcloth and ashes, traditional signs of mourning (v.1). They separated themselves from (unbelieving) foreigners in accordance with the Law, and confessed their sins before God (v.2). A three hour worship service of hearing Scripture read and explained was followed by a further three hours of confession and worship (v.3).
The Levites commenced their prayer by calling the Jews to “Stand up and bless the LORD your God from everlasting to everlasting. Blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise” (v.5).
The prayer then worshiped and acknowledged God as the Creator and Sustainer (v.6). Just as the Law started with Creation in Genesis 1, so too did their prayer.
Next the prayer spoke of God’s faithfulness from Genesis to the wilderness wanderings (vv.7-15). It described the calling of Abram, God’s wonders and deliverance of the Jews from Egypt, his giving the Law to instruct and guide them, and his provision for them of food and drink and a land to possess.
Then the prayer spoke of God’s faithfulness and graciousness, and how he was compassionate to their ancestors as they continually sinned (v.16-21). This is in marked contrast to the God who delivered kings and cities to the Jews as they conquered the Land (vv.22-25).
At this point, the prayer turned to an open confession of sin (vv.26-31). God’s People acknowledged together how they had failed to keep God’s commands over the centuries, and also how God’s mercy and compassion was shown by not wiping them out.
That same mercy and compassion expressed through God’s covenant was the grounds for God’s People in that present day to rest on, despite the hardship that had come upon them (v.32). They recognised that those hardships were due to unbelief and God was justified in sending and continuing them, due to how he was met with continued unbelief (vv.33-35).
In this context, they cried out to God, asking him to intervene and help them as they were in a state of bondage (v.36). Because of their past sins, they found themselves ruled as slaves in their land, unlike their Fathers (v.37). This prayer acknowledged God’s hand over all things and ability to help.
Finally, they made a solemn and sincere recommitment to serving God and being faithful to God’s covenant as a people (v.38). Their prayer ended with devoting themselves to trusting and obeying God, and demonstrating this by putting pen to paper to confirm it.
This was not a rote prayer, like a bunch of unbelievers reciting the Lord’s Prayer but not meaning a word. Nor was it a checklist of items wanted. This was heartfelt, serious prayer which reflected a commitment to God in word and deed.
Their prayer recognised that their present situation was the result of their sin, past and present. They recognised that for things to change, repentance was required, and God’s move to change their situation.
It was also a prayer focused on God, and God’s past savings acts, and God’s ability to provide for them now.
When we pray, our prayers should be similarly focused on God. They should proclaim God’s power and wonder in Creation, and God’s past saving acts for his people and for us as individuals. We can also remember past ways God has worked for our benefit, and thank him for those.
With that in mind, our prayers for God’s provision change shape, becoming less about what we want and more about God’s ability to faithfully provide for us now.
It also reminds us that the obedience that we desire, and ask God to provide, must be a response to God’s graciousness and goodness to us in salvation, and not to try and earn God’s favour.
Just as the covenant renewal at the end of this prayer was a new beginning, each prayer of confession we make is a new beginning. We acknowledge our past, confess our failure, and seek God’s help to serve him anew.