Some years ago I was in the Middle East and wanted to purchase a Persian rug. From a previous trip I already had a nice large area rug, so I was just looking for a small throw rug. I picked one out, rolled it up, and brought it home. When I unrolled it, I unexpectedly tripped over something. Upon inspection, there was a small compass strategically glued to one end of the rug. I realized that it wasn’t just a Persian rug, it was a prayer rug, and the compass was meant to help a person kneeling on it find the direction to the Kaaba in Mecca, the location to which Muslims pray (Here’s a random fact: if you really wanted to pray toward Mecca from most places in the world, you’d pray downwards through the earth…unless we believe that prayers are affected by gravity and circumnavigate the globe).
I removed the compass and put that rug to work as a throw rug, but to this day there is still some glue residue in that spot. The real residue was the thought that stuck in my mind that day: Why don't Christians still pray in a certain direction?
After all, Daniel prayed in a certain direction from his exile in
Persia,
When Daniel knew [that a
document making prayer to anyone other than Darius illegal] had been
signed, he went to his house where he had the windows in his upper chamber open
toward Jerusalem. He got down on his knees three times a day and prayed
and gave thanks before his God, as he had done previously. ~ Daniel 6:10 (emphasis
mine)
Unlike Muslims, Daniel had a reason for praying toward
Jerusalem. This was where the temple had been, and where God made his dwelling
place on earth. When this temple was dedicated something interesting happened,
while this was the dwelling place of God on earth, Solomon did not pray toward
the temple, he “knelt on his knees in the presence of all the assembly of
Israel and spread out his hands toward heaven…” (2 Chronicles 6:13, emphasis
mine). Despite the dwelling place of God being with men, and the temple
being completed, Solomon still prayed toward heaven.
Further he said, “Behold, heaven and the highest heaven
cannot contain you, how much less this house that I have built” (2 Chronicles
6:18), but then he said something that explained Daniel’s directional prayer,
Yet have regard to the prayer of
your servant and to his plea, O Lord my God, listening to the cry
and to the prayer that your servant prays before you, that your eyes may be
open day and night toward this house, the place where you have promised
to set your name, that you may listen to the prayer that your servant offers
toward this place. And listen to the pleas of your servant and of your
people Israel, when they pray toward this place. And listen from heaven
your dwelling place, and when you hear, forgive. ~ 2 Chronicles 6:19-20 (emphasis
mine, Compare 1 Kings 8:30-48)
It wasn’t until Solomon finished his prayer that God filled
the temple,
As soon as Solomon finished his
prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the
sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord
filled the temple. ~ 2 Chronicles 7:1 (emphasis mine)
Others who prayed toward Jerusalem were Jonah even from the
belly of a fish (Jonah 2:4,7) and David when the temple of God was still just
a tabernacle (Psalm 5:7).
But those who prayed fervently but without a physical
direction include Nehemiah (Nehemiah 1:4-6), Ezekiel (Ezekiel 1:1-3), and Jeremiah
(Lamentations 3:55-57), and most importantly, Jesus.
When Jesus visited Samaria there was a pile of rubble on top
of Mount Gerizim and the temple on Mount Zion (in Jerusalem) had been rebuilt
by Zerubbabel and renovated/expanded by Herod (which is why we call it “Herod’s
temple”, I still call it “Zerubbabel’s temple”). Yet the Samaritans still
insisted that Gerizim was the proper place to worship God. A Samaritan woman
saw her chance to ask a prophet which mountain was the right mountain: “Our
fathers worshipped on this mountain, but y’all say that in Jerusalem is the
place where people ought to worship” (John 4:20, y’all is the proper
translation of her question, implying that Judeans (the country surrounding
Jerusalem), not just Jesus, said that Zion was the location of God’s temple).
Jesus answered,
The hour is coming when neither on
this mountain (Gerizim) nor in Jerusalem (Zion) will you worship the Father.
You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is
from the Jews (an abbreviated way to say Judeans). But the hour is coming, and
is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and
truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and
those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. ~ John 4:21-24
Jesus’ answer is clear, the proper place to pray to the
Father is not location or direction dependent, it’s from the inward places: in
spirit and truth. When I teach this to kids I point to the heart, “in spirit
and,” I point to the head, “in truth."
In the Daniel account it’s easy to see why Daniel would pray
toward Jerusalem. Or is it? To make it complicated, in Ezekiel 10 the glory of
the Lord had departed from the temple,
we call it “ichabod” or literally, “The Glory Has Departed” (the “i” is a
negation of “chabod” or glory). So God no longer lived in Solomon’s temple…and
there was no Solomon’s temple. Solomon’s temple had been burned not too long
after the event of ichabod. This was some four decades before Daniel would pray
in that direction. It is almost guaranteed that Daniel was familiar with those
two events, yet he still prayed toward Jerusalem. Charles Spurgeon believed it
was because Jerusalem was the symbol of God’s covenant promises, remembering
God’s specific promises to restore his people, in another place he mentioned
that Daniel had an expectation of a rebuilt temple. I believe Daniel knew the
temple would be rebuilt because he prophesied that it would be destroyed again
(Daniel 9:26), a prophecy that was fulfilled when Roman General Titus destroyed the
temple in AD 70 and its stones were ripped one from another to access the gold
that had flowed between them in a molten state (Matthew
24:2).
So while Daniel prayed toward Jerusalem, the time has come
and is now here where we don’t pray toward Jerusalem because it’s no longer where
God lives. We worship him in spirit and in truth. His temple and dwelling place
on earth is his church, made up of living stones, and while another temple will
be built sometime in the future, it won’t be where God lives. Jews still pray towards the Temple Mount at the Wailing Wall, but Christians pray in a different direction.
So which way do we pray? We pray toward God, "Our God is
in the heavens, he does whatever he pleases" (Psalm 115:3, emphasis mine).
Psalm 121:1-2 say that when the Psalmist looked to the hills, he wondered, “Where
does my help come from?” It’s not from earth or sky, it’s from the maker of
these things! In another place it says, “To you I lift up my eyes, O you who
are enthroned in the heavens!” (Psalm 123:1, emphasis mine).
Jesus prayed for his disciples and all who would come to
faith through their words by lifting up his eyes toward heaven (John 17:1). But
David in Psalm 40:12 and 138:2, Ezra in Ezra 9:6, and the tax collector in Luke
18:13 looked down, in humility and shame. Why is that some would look up and
others would look down?
Job 22:26 gives us the answer, that we delight ourselves in
the Almighty and “lift up our faces to God.” We see the Israelites in the desert looking up,
but not to heaven, toward a different object. Moses made a bronze serpent in
the shape of the curse that was afflicting the wandering Israelites: if they’d
look up, they would be healed and saved from the curse of their sin (Numbers
21:9). Jesus explicitly tells us that was a foreshadowing of him being lifted
up on the cross (John 3:14-17), where we would would look to him, all the ends of the
earth, and be saved (Isaiah 45:22).
When we pray we still hold to the example of that tax-collector,
and humility is good, but it’s not the only way to pray. Often in the
counseling room I’ll be actively and silently praying while listening to
someone talk. It would be very distracting to bow my head right then and there.
While driving it would be very inadvisable to close your eyes and bow your
head. We walk by faith, not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7), but that doesn’t mean
literally that we should be driving with our eyes closed. I learned long ago to
give invitations for the whole man, “With every head raised, every eye open, no
feet moving, and no music playing: God is ready to hear your prayer of
repentance, he’ll meet you at your seat or the altar is open.”
The most important direction to pray is toward God.
Hezekiah, when he was dying, turned away from men so that he could pray
directly to God (2 Kings 20:2-3, Isaiah 38:2-3), the Israelites had to look
away from Moses and the fiery snakes to look to the bronze serpent (Numbers 21:9),
the Psalmist looked away from the hills to seek help from the Lord (Psalm 121:1-2).
The author of Hebrews tells us to run the race looking to Jesus (Hebrews
12:1-2). Where does God dwell? He dwells in the heavens, but he also lives in
you if you’ve been born again (John 14:17, 1 Corinthians 3:16, 2 Timothy 1:14).
In humility I recommend head bowed and eyes closed, in exaltation I recommend
head raised and eyes up. We know the cross is just a symbol, but beloved try
praying while looking to the cross, which is both a horrid symbol of the curse
and a glorious symbol of God’s love. Stuart Townend wrote, “Come see the cross where love and mercy meet!” (Psalm 85:10-11).
And what about facing people? We rarely lay hands on those
we’re praying for, but Jesus and Paul didn’t hesitate to physically touch those
they were praying for. I’m not a mystic (dabbling in mysteries) but I have to
admit that there is something mystically wonderful in the laying on hands
(compare 1 Timothy 4:14, 5:22) as well as lifting holy hands toward heaven (Nehemiah
8:6, Psalm 28:2, Psalm 63:4, Psalm 119:48, Psalm 134:2, Psalm 141:2, 1 Timothy
2:8, Hebrews 12:12).
When I and many other pastors give the benediction, we lift
our hands in the direction of the congregation. This isn’t just tradition, this
is following the example of Jesus, “He led [his disciples] out as far as
Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them” (Luke 24:50, compare Leviticus
9:22).
Now here’s where I might take this a bit too far, but I don’t
think there is any sin in it. Daniel prayed toward Jerusalem, toward a
destroyed temple, toward a hope for the future, and toward a place where he
longed for the Spirit of God to dwell again. If you have a loved one who is
running from God, I think your heart can yearn for them by praying in their
general direction. After all, what are they but an empty structure where God has no
dwelling place (Ephesians 2:1-3)? Our great desire is that they may be saved (Romans
9:3, 10:1), that God would make his dwelling place among them and walk among
them, and that he would be their God and they would be his people (2
Corinthians 6:16). The Prodigal Son’s father was looking in the direction whence
his son might return (Luke 15:20). Pray that they would say like Emily Elliott, "O come to my heart, Lord Jesus, there is room in my heart for Thee."
Now, you don’t have to pray in their general or specific
direction, especially if you don’t know where they are. The greatest place to
approach is the throne of grace (Hebrews 4:16). God knows where they are, even
if they’re running, and it’s been rightly said (generally using Jonah 1:3 as an
example), “God can hit a moving target.” So pray ultimately toward
God for your wayward prodigal:
They can run from you, they can run
from their upbringing, they can run from the church, they can run from God, but
they can never run from your prayers. ~ Andrew van der Bijl
Paul concluded his list of spiritual warfare accoutrements
with, “Praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication”
(Ephesians 6:18). Elsewhere we pray unceasingly (1 Thessalonians 1:2, 3:10,
5:17, 2 Thessalonians 2:17). Pray that God will direct their hearts to the love
of God and to the steadfastness of Christ (2 Thessalonians 3:5).
Our prayers can go where we cannot; there are no borders, no prison walls, no doors that are closed to us when we pray. ~ Andrew van der Bijl
So, all this to say, pray toward God. Pray toward his dwelling place, pray toward his Son, pray toward his Spirit. Pray looking up, pray looking down. Pray with eyes open beholding the horror of the cross, pray with eyes open in wonder beholding the empty cross because his work is finished and he is risen. Pray with eyes closed to shut out distractions, pray with head down to express your humility. Pray with hands lifted high, pray with hands laid on people within the church (his temple on earth), pray toward the people you want God to indwell.
And above all, if you don’t know which direction to pray: Just pray.
Lift up your hands to the holy
place and bless the Lord! ~
Let us lift up our hearts and hands
to God in heaven! ~ Lamentations 3:41
Jesus said to them, “I am the way,
the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” ~ John
14:6
__________________
Further Reading:
Better Chaplain Series – Pray for People
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