Meditation: When Your Prayer Is of God

06/24/2025
The focus of St. James Presbyterian Church’s weekly 30-minute Prayer Break Gathering is based on one of the scriptures of our PCUSA Daily Lectionary, Acts 5.27-29, 33-35, 38-42. Today we will be focusing our thoughts on verse 29.


 
Meditation: When Your Prayer Is of God
 
As we gather in prayer —bodies aching, hearts full, some of us weary, some of us rejoicing—I invite us to hold close the sacred tension of this text in Acts.
Here we see Peter and the apostles standing before the council, accused, reprimanded, and threatened. They have been told not to teach in the name of Jesus. Not to stir up hope. Not to proclaim liberation. Not to disrupt the order of things. And what is their response?
“We must obey God rather than any human authority.”
Let those words settle into your spirit.
In a world that tries to quiet the voice of justice, that resists the demands of love, that punishes those who speak up for the oppressed, your prayers—yes, your prayers—matter. Because when your prayer is of God, no threat, no power, no institution can undo it.
The council, hearing this bold declaration, responds in rage. They want to kill them. Because the world doesn’t know what to do with courage. It trembles before conviction. But into that chaos, Gamaliel—a Pharisee, a teacher of the law, a man with enough wisdom to pause—offers a word of clarity.
He says: If this plan or undertaking is of human origin, it will fail. But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them—in that case you may even be found fighting against God!
What a mighty truth. What a sacred reassurance. What a deep breath for the soul.
Because sometimes, beloved, your prayers will seem too radical, your dreams too disruptive, your faith too dangerous. But the question is not whether they make others comfortable—it is whether they are of God.
And how do we know when our prayers are of God?
 When they call for justice, like rivers.
 When they lift the lowly and challenge the mighty.
 When they proclaim freedom for those in chains—both literal and spiritual.
 When they comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.
 When they echo Christ’s love, bold and unrelenting.
Some of you came here tonight with prayers that feel risky. Some of you are praying for a world that doesn’t yet exist. Some of you are praying with trembling hands because you’ve been told to keep quiet, to stay in your place, to play it safe.
Here and now, I want to say to you: Pray anyway. Speak anyway. Love anyway. Work for justice anyway.
Because if your prayer is of God, it will take root. It will rise. It will endure beyond what you can see.
The apostles left that place, not in despair—but rejoicing. Rejoicing that they were considered worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. And every day, they kept right on teaching and proclaiming Jesus as the Christ. Every day, without ceasing.
So tonight, beloved, pray your prayers.
Pray them loud. Pray them trembling.  Pray them with a fire that no council, no critic, no empire can extinguish. Because if your prayer is of God, it will not be overthrown. And neither will you.
 
What prayers do you bring today, knowing with boldness that they are of God?
​