Reverence. According to Calvin, the first rule for proper prayer is a disposition of mind and heart, “freed from carnal cares”[1]; in a word: reverence. Keeping one’s mind attentively focused on the Divine avoids “undisciplined and irreverent prayer,” easily identified by “wandering thoughts” and “stupid…wicked emotions.”[2] Reverence in prayer can guard against popular 21st century evangelical temptations for prayer to become too conversational: “although prayer is an intimate conversation of the pious with God, yet reverence and moderation must be kept, lest we give loose rein to miscellaneous requests, and lest we crave more than God allows; further, that we should lift up our minds to a pure and chaste veneration of him, lest God’s majesty become worthless for us.”[3] Calvin would be quick to see miscellaneous requests far outweighing God’s majesty in our day!
Writing with a pastoral tone, Barry Murr traces how Calvin can reorient prayer that is “mechanistic, legalistic, and…motivated by fear and duty” to the correct starting point of “respect and reverence”: “If our theology begins with God, our prayer should follow suit. This order requires a certain discipline, a discipline important to the sixteenth-century Reformers.”[4] He also aptly describes, when reverence is lost, how easily an evangelical culture can hijack prayer to serve secular endeavors: “When prayer is associated with and even defined by its ritual use in our sporting event, graduation ceremonies, legislative sessions, and other societal events, it becomes a self-serving practice, directed by us to God and legitimizing our civic observances by lending them a religious aura.”[5]
Need & Desire. Secondly, we must earnestly “desire to attain” in prayer. Calvin contrasts this with “set form” prayers that are recited from habit and proceed from cold hearts that “do not ponder what they ask.” The godly must request with yearning, “with sincere affection of the heart, and at the same time desire to obtain it.”[6] However, if one is honest, many times there is not a strong desire to pray. Calvin recognizes this posture in many places: “slothfulness,” “vegetate,”[7] “lazy.”[8] This is no reason to not pray, but instead should be seen as God “summoning us to himself.”[9]
Humility & Submission. Thirdly, Daniel, David, Isaiah, and Jeremiah are examples of those who “abandon all thought of his own glory, cast off all notion of his own worth…[and] put away all self-assurance.”[10] Being humble and submissive to the Word of God in prayer means asking for forgiveness of sins; this is the beginning and preparation of right prayer, is an on-going thing for the godly, but it is also the starting point: reconciliation to God is of first importance before receiving anything else from him.
Genuine Confidence. Fourthly, one who is truly subdued with humility and submission before God prays rightly when his prayer is confident in the sure hope that God hears and will answer. Confident assurance is not always soothing, but may at times be full of distress, trouble, unrest, and tribulation.[11]
For among such tribulation God’s goodness so shines upon them [the saints] that even when they groan with weariness under the weight of present ills, and also are troubled and tormented by the fear of greater ones, yet, relying upon his goodness, they are relieved of the difficulty of bearing them, and are solaced and hope for escape and deliverance. It is fitting therefore that the godly man’s prayer arise from these two emotions…That is, that he groan under present ills and anxiously fear those to come, yet at the same time take refuge in God, not at all doubting he is ready to extend his helping hand.[12]
From Calvin’s four rules of right prayer—although he doesn’t state it explicitly—it is clear that the heart of prayer is the Gospel. A reverence before God, acknowledging his goodness and majesty; a true longing for his presence; a humble, contrite confession of our sin; and a bold confidence in his favor toward us—where else can these contrary things find their resolution except in Christ himself? Christ, the truly reverent, unswervingly desirous for the Father, ultimately humble in his incarnation, and perfectly confident in his resurrection, took upon himself all our sin and misery so that we can come before God with awe, desire, submission, and confidence! This view of prayer, rooted in the Gospel of our Lord, is not only a critique of small prayer, but can serve as a beautiful guide for the church today.
[1] Institutes 3.20.4.
[2] Institutes 3.20.5.
[3] Institutes 3.20.16.
[4] Murr, Barry. “Treasure in plain sight: prayer in John Calvin’s theology.” Vision (Winnipeg, Man.) 7, no. 2 (September 1, 2006): 20,24.
[5] “Treasure in Plain Sight,” 21.
[6] Institutes 3.20.6.
[7] Institutes 3.20.5.
[8] Institutes 3.20.7.
[9] Institutes 3.20.6.
[10] Institutes 3.20.8.
[11] Institutes 3.20.11.
[12] Institutes 3.20.11.
Building Bridges 