Going Higher with God in Prayer: Cultivating a Lifelong Dialogue

“If we are not living in prayer, we are not experiencing the life God has for us,” suggests the late pastor Tozer (A Cloud by Day, a Fire by Night) in these bracing if pugnacious sermons, drawn from his previously unpublished recordings, on how Christians can pray better. Tozer uses Jacob’s ladder to heaven as a metaphor to suggest that proper prayer requires Christians to disengage from worldly affairs: “We need to understand that the closer we get to God, the farther away we are from the world.” The consequences of ineffective prayers are dire, Tozer contends, since they go unanswered and “chill and discourage praying people.” To pray effectively, Tozer urges readers to follow Jesus’s example by embodying Christian piety, because while God sometimes answers “emergency prayers” made during times of duress, “His highest will” is for Christians to live out their faith before they need it. Provocative takes might alienate some readers (“God does not hear every prayer”), but Tozer’s forthright style and thoughtful scriptural analysis show why his archives continue to produce nuggets of wisdom over 50 years after his death. Fans will want to check this out. (July)