Jeff Bridgforth :: Webcraftsman

Crafting Web sites since 1999

I am a Web designer passionate about creating elegant, inspiring, and usable Web experiences that connect with an audience and fulfull business objectives.

Group Prayer

February 2, 2006

Ministry Thoughts · Spiritual Musings

I had this email in my box that came from GodSquad.com.

I have recently been chal­lenged on Group Prayer by some­one who believes that the Mathew6v5-15 pro­hibits one from group prayer, par­tic­u­larly because it was an instruc­tion given to us by Jesus.

Here is my response: You need to con­sider the con­text of Matthew 6. Jesus is preach­ing against doing out­wardly reli­gious things to get the atten­tion of oth­ers. He is not pro­hibit­ing group prayer. If that was the case, why do you see group prayer in the book of Acts? Acts 4:24–31 would be a good example.

The impor­tant thing in inter­pret­ing Scrip­ture is to always con­sider the con­text. You also have to com­pare it to what the Bible as a whole teaches or sets forth as exam­ple. Read­ing the book of Acts, we see that Chris­tians gath­ered in groups to pray. Matthew 18:20 says, “For where two or three have gath­ered together in My name, I am there in their midst.”

I would also add that the Bible teaches that we are to gather in com­mu­nity to encour­age and grow. That is the pur­pose of the church. My thought is that if you take the line of think­ing that pro­hibits group prayer, you could begin to make an argu­ment against gath­er­ing together to do any spir­i­tual activ­ity. That is just wrong theology.

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