There was a tragic story in last weekend’s Strib, Tragedy follows invitation to prayer, about the Rev. Kyle Lake, a minister who accidentally electrocuted himself as he launched a 30-day campaign at his church based on the book, Suprise Me: A 30-day faith experiment. The book’s author, Terry Esau, was there. Esau, in a Q&A with the Strib, reportedly said:
As you realized what was going on, I was going, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’ I couldn’t believe it. My first feelings were anger. I thought, You’ve got to be joking, God. You can’t be serious… Kyle believed that stuff happens, and it happened that day. He violated the physical laws of nature. Electricity is there. If you violate it, it has consequences. I don’t know. There are so many things that happen. And I know there’s the theology that says God causes and ordains all things and there’s also the concept of free will, that we get to choose. Where do those things collide and come out? I don’t really know.
I like the basic idea of Esau’s experiment because it avoids the pitfall of false prayer, i.e., asking God to give you what you want. He writes:
Every day, for thirty days, I pray and ask God to surprise me? “Surprise Me, God.†Nothing more, nothing less. Three words. Not asking for something in particular. Not giving him my list. Not presenting my agenda. Just inviting him to barge into my life in any old way he pleases-to crash into the busyness of my schedule and mess with it.
I’ve not read the book but where I think he goes wrong — and the electrocution illustrates it — is presuming that God can pull levers in the physical universe. It’s a destructive belief and undermines the potential of a truer, more helpful prayer, eg, “Help me see something surprising today” or “If something surprising happens today, help me respond in a way that’s helpful.”
When I told my daughter about the article, she reminded me about this Far Side cartoon of God at his computer, poised to “smite” the dufus guy walking under the dangling piano. I love this cartoon because it’s the perfect illustration of how many people view God.