Are You Ever Discouraged by Christian Encouragers?

Okay, I’m just going to get this off my chest: I get really tired of Christian encouragers. (Ah, I feel better already).

These "encouragers" (quotation marks here indicate a somewhat ironic tone) believe they've been given the "gift of encouragement," so they miss no opportunity to offer you oh so helpful advice about nearly everything. Not to mention their constant stroking of your feathers if they think perhaps you’re being a little too down on yourself or something. They never miss a chance to tell you how wonderful and gifted you are, and then they tell you what you need to do in order to really, you know, live the life God wants you to live (or whatever).

And for crying out loud, don’t let them pray for you. It’s like giving a microphone to a politician. Now they’ve got the floor and can really hold forth. Instead of actually praying for you they tell you the things they think you ought to do in order to deal with the issue for which you sought prayer. Maybe you say, "I’m really having some trouble with my teenage son. I don’t seem to be able to talk to him anymore." Well, the discouraging encourager will "pray" a whole agenda of things that you should do. All these things have been revealed to him/her by God of course. "I believe that God is telling me that you really need to put your foot down as a Dad." Or perhaps, "God wants me to tell you that you need to take your boy out to a ball game and bond with him." You get the idea. This kind of thing can go on for a while, so you might as well settle in.

Either that, or you can just say, "Thanks, man, but I really wasn’t looking for your extended analysis of my situation all gussied up as prayer."

Oh, and then there’s the "spiritual" side of their advice. You know, they lay hands on the poor prayer recipient, who is perhaps suffering through depression or a broken marriage or addiction or who knows what, and they say, "Dear, you just really need to have more faith. You need to believe in your miracle. Are you reading your Bible every day, girl? Maybe you should come to the church prayer meeting on Wednesday night," etc., etc., etc. All this and more they squeeze between the words, "Dear God" and "Amen."

I haven’t done a careful Scriptural study of this, but I suspect that most Biblical prayers are not like this at all. Instead, they’re prayers to God asking Him to move, to intervene, to glorify Himself in the life of the person(s) being prayed for, rather than simply detailing the action-steps that the recipient should take.