Prayer is indeed a mystery, but it is stressed over and over again in the New Testament as a vital prerequisite for the release and experience of God’s power. It is true that it is God who delivers, and that God stands in no need of human prayers before He can act on behalf of His afflicted servants. Yet there is the manward as well as the Godward aspect of such deliverance, and the manward side is summed up in the duty of Christians to intercede… In prayer, human impotence casts itself at the feet of divine omnipotence. Thus the duty of prayer is not a modification of God’s power, but a glorification of it.
— Philip Hughes (1915–1990), Anglikanischer Priester, Neutestamentler und Theologe
Topics: Prayer & Silence, God, Jesus & the Holy Spirit, Illness & Weakness
Occasions: For Reflection
Philip Hughes
Philip Edgcumbe Hughes (1915–1990) war ein anglikanischer Priester und Neutestamentler, der an theologischen Seminaren in England und den USA lehrte. Er stand für eine reformierte Schriftauslegung, löste jedoch im evangelikalen Spektrum durch seine Befürwortung der bedingten Unsterblichkeit theologische Kontroversen aus. Heutigen Bibellesern erschließen seine Kommentare die biblischen Texte durch die Verknüpfung historisch-theologischer Gelehrsamkeit mit detaillierter Exegese.
All quotes by Philip Hughes (9)
When we pray, the circumstances often remain the same, but we become different.
Oswald Chambers
Prayer does not change God, but the one who prays.
Søren Kierkegaard
Courage is fear that has said its prayers.
Corrie ten Boom
To pray is to draw breath from God.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Prayer does not equip us for greater works – prayer is the greater work.
Oswald Chambers
God has his ear at your heart.
Augustine of Hippo
Prayers are tools not for doing or getting, but for being and becoming.
Eugene Peterson