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Last night as I was getting the trash out to the street curb, a beautiful 8-point buck gave me the stare down from about 30 yards away. I cease to be amazed at the number of deer and their relative tame-ness in our neighborhood. It is so cool to see 20-25 different deer each day in our yard. I'm thinking real soon, Mandy and the girls are going to have them all named.
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Yesterday, I was reflecting again on that very obscure prayer of a guy named Agur found in Proverbs 30.7-9.
Two things I ask of you, O LORD;
do not refuse me before I die:
Keep falsehood and lies far from me;
give me neither poverty nor riches,
but give me only my daily bread.
Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
and say, 'Who is the LORD?'
Or I may become poor and steal,
and so dishonor the name of my God.
What draws my attention again and again to Agur's prayer is the stark contrast between his plea and the plea of Jabez. You remember the prayer of Jabez, don't you? Bruce Wilkinson turned Jabez's prayer into a best-seller. Jabez's prayer was, essentially, an appeal for tangible blessing from God. Wilkinson, using Jabez's prayer as a model, developed it into a "success formula" for spiritual and material blessing.
How remarkably different is Agur's appeal. He asks for the blessings of God, but not too much because he realizes the adverse effects brought on by too many material possessions. Agur realized that it is very possible for a person's possessions to possess them and he wanted no part of that.
Can I ask you this morning to reflect on your prayer life and ask yourself: is my prayer life more like Jabez's or Agur's? To me, it is a telling statement on the culture of religion in America that Jabez's prayer turned into a best-selling book and Agur's prayer is still relegated to the obscurity bin of Scripture.
