The March 31, 1997, edition of Newsweek ran a cover story on prayer. A couple of responses from readers to the story (found in the April 21, 1997, issue) illustrate just how “presuppositions” shape the way that people understand God’s participation, or lack thereof, in the affairs of life.

Answered prayer or lottery of life?

One reader responded:

God always answers prayers. . . . Sometimes it is his perfect timing to answer “yes” to a person’s prayer, and sometimes it is for the person’s benefit for him to answer “no” or “wait.” God is not a genie: he is a loving Father who gives his children things they ask for in his will and when it is best for them.

Another said:

Life is like clay pigeon shooting—some people luck out and some people don’t. . . . When [people] pray and get they wished for, they are sure that their prayers were “answered.” When they pray and don’t get what they wanted, it was “God’s will.” Actually, it is always just random chance.

Neither statement can be tested in some so-called objective fashion. Each reveals the presuppositions that one brings to the experience of life. Each reveals its own kind of “leap of faith.” In many ways the issue is about blessing. When we pray for a blessing and get a blessing, is it just by chance, is it magic or is it indeed the work of divine providence?

The blessing of Abram

In the Old Testament one of the first blessings we read is of Abram. In Genesis 12: 1 – 3 we read:-

12 The Lord had said to Abram, ‘Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.
2 ‘I will make you into a great nation,
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.[a]
3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.’[b]

One of the issues in the Old Testament, according to the Interpreter’s dictionary of the Bible, is that it is very difficult to distinguish in many cases between blessings and cursings that belong to the realm of magic – in which the words and actions of the one who blesses or curses are entirely in his control and accomplish his purposes at his bidding – and those which are strictly religious in their understanding and use – where the blessings and cursings are conceived to have their origin and effect in the power and purpose of the deity.

The blessing of Abram is one of the many, however, that are a divine blessing and not a magical spell. There are others that are not so clear. This blessing is not to make Abram great but that God would be known all around the world. The force of the whole section is the very last verse: “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you”. This is reinforced later in the Abram story when God reaffirms the blessing on all nations through Abraham’s descendants after Abraham proved his obedience to God.

Isaiah

Of course, as we know, that blessing was limited, not by God, but by the people. In spite of verses such as Isaiah 56: 3 – 7. In it the prophet speaks the word of God when he says:-

Let no foreigner who is bound to the Lord say,
‘The Lord will surely exclude me from his people.’
And let no eunuch complain,
‘I am only a dry tree.’
4 For this is what the Lord says:
‘To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
who choose what pleases me
and hold fast to my covenant –
5 to them I will give within my temple and its walls
a memorial and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that will endure for ever.
6 And foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord
to minister to him,
to love the name of the Lord,
and to be his servants,
all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it
and who hold fast to my covenant –
7 these I will bring to my holy mountain
and give them joy in my house of prayer.
Their burnt offerings and sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house will be called
a house of prayer for all nations.’

Yet in spite of this, Foreigners and Eunuchs, at the time of Jesus, would have got no further than the outer court of the temple, that same court where the money changers and animal traders were doing their business.Could you pray surrounded by goats, sheep and doves? Could you pray while surrounded by people shouting their exchange rate for temple coins?

Acts

This is why Acts 8 is so important because it connects directly with a number of key theological issues of Acts. We will focus first on the theme of witness. Through Philip’s witness of the gospel, “outsiders” are invited to participate fully in the worship of God. Whether people live under the oppression of darkness or exclusivism, the gospel offers liberation from the forces that enslave and alienate.

Listen to Luke’s record of Philip’s mission to the Samaritans:-

4 Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.5 Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah there.6 When the crowds heard Philip and saw the signs he performed, they all paid close attention to what he said. 7 For with shrieks, impure spirits came out of many, and many who were paralysed or lame were healed. 8 So there was great joy in that city.
Simon the sorcerer
9 Now for some time a man named Simon had practised sorcery in the city and amazed all the people of Samaria. He boasted that he was someone great,10 and all the people, both high and low, gave him their attention and exclaimed, ‘This man is rightly called the Great Power of God.’ 11 They followed him because he had amazed them for a long time with his sorcery.12 But when they believed Philip as he proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptised, both men and women. 13 Simon himself believed and was baptised. And he followed Philip everywhere, astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw.
14 When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to Samaria. 15 When they arrived, they prayed for the new believers there that they might receive the Holy Spirit,16 because the Holy Spirit had not yet come on any of them; they had simply been baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus. 17 Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.
18 When Simon saw that the Spirit was given at the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money 19 and said, ‘Give me also this ability so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.’
20 Peter answered: ‘May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! 21 You have no part or share in this ministry, because your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. 23 For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.’
24 Then Simon answered, ‘Pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me.’
25 After they had further proclaimed the word of the Lord and testified about Jesus, Peter and John returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel in many Samaritan villages.

Samaritans were the most immediate and glaring of the so-called outsiders to the Jew, as they lived right on their borders. Simon, of course, goes further into the realm of outsiders as he was a sorcerer – a magician who manipulated people and situations in order to gain prestige and wealth. Looking at the story of Philip and Simon in order to translate it into our own context requires thoughtful study. We appear trite and irrelevant if our application of Luke’s message of liberation from the forces of magic is nothing more than a diatribe against reading over the horoscopes or attending a David Copperfield “night of magic.” Philip is not offering the gospel to liberate people from mundane forms of amusement.

Perhaps we should recall what “magic”, in this context was. It was the desire to control one’s fate and circumstances through the manipulation of forces that you perceived made the world go round. But the story in Acts shows that, ironically, submission to the magic of Simon – the manipulative tricks that promised liberation – itself became a force of bondage from which the Samaritans needed to be liberated. The question then becomes, what do we, in our day and time, identify as the forces that promise freedom, but which, when followed blindly, deliver only another kind of bondage? Are we slaves to that better-paying job that promised greater financial independence? Do we acquire power to liberate ourselves from those who would lord over us, only to discover that the fear of losing power now enslaves us? Are we addicted to buying lottery tickets, week in and week out in the hope of that one great payday that would free us financially? False liberators, like Simon and his magic, become the oppressors.

The gospel to which we bear witness promises liberation from the seductive forces that offer only counterfeit freedom. The gospel does not liberate by providing some better means to find so much money that we don’t need to worry about the bills anymore or so much power over other people that we don’t have to worry about being pushed around anymore. A “gospel” that offers these is only another form of magic, preached in the name of Jesus rather than Simon.

The gospel to which we bear witness has the potential to liberate from the very need of false liberation

Simon offers his money to Peter in order to expand his bag of manipulative tricks. Simon shows he’s still not liberated from his need to try to manipulate life and seduce people with his charisma. Barnabas on the other hand, four chapters earlier in Acts, offered his money to demonstrate his submission to the gospel and, by this very act of submission, showed himself liberated from the need to hoard for himself resources he did not need. We get a sense, at the end of this story, that Simon is still not truly free.

How many of us, sitting here in the pews every Sunday week in and week out are like Simon: we have believed and been baptized, but we are still not free? We still do not accept the full blessing of our God which is liberty. Liberty from sin; liberty from the control of wealth, power, and prestige.